ABU DHABI GP – Hamilton beats Rosberg to pole by an narrow margin ahead of title decider
Lewis Hamilton has beat Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg to take pole position for the title deciding Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The world champion looked to have the slight edge over his team-mate throughout the session as he hopes to retain his title.
However, Hamilton would have been hoping that the there could have been a few cars in-between him and Rosberg as he knows his team-mate only requires a podium to steal his world title. But it was a good lap from the brit who pulled one of his best laps together to get three tenths over Rosberg.
Hamilton showed us what he can do under pressure as he is the hunter and can only do his best this weekend and hope that Rosberg has problems with his car and drops down the points to seal that title. He told Sky Sports “I’ve got the car in a real sweet spot. I’m in a perfect position for tomorrow.”
Once again Red Bull had the upper hand getting Daniel Ricciardo into third ahead of the Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel. However, the Red Bull’s used the less durable ultrasoft tyres in Q2 to set their fastest laps meaning they may have the more difficult race.
This could affect their race strategy as there need to pit earlier as the tyre life isn’t as long the teams around them. It was a messy session for Ricciardo’s team-mate Max Verstappen in Q3, as he ran off at Turn Eleven losing time on his last lap.
But yesterday in FP2, Red Bull looked to have the same as the Mercedes on there long runs.
The Force India’s put in another strong performance once again, with Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez out qualifying the Williams along with the McLaren of Fernando Alonso, Felipe Massa will start tenth after he made it through to Q3 unlike team-mate Valtteri Bottas who just missed out after Alonso improved on his last lap in Q2.
Jenson Button, who is heading into what may be his final race starts twelfth. Button was just .2 down on the cut off for Q3 after he failed to improve enough to get through.
He told BBC News “Fernando did a good job but I think we did too. We start just outside the top 10. With that, we can start with new tyres and tyre a different strategy, which could be good. I’m looking forward to the race”
Both Haas’s made it through to Q2, with Esteban Gutiérrez out qualifying team-mate Romain Grosjean. But both are ahead of the Renault’s with Joloyon Palmer getting through while Kevin Magnussen fell at the first hurdle being three tenths down on his team-mate.
Result
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