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Bahrain GP: Lewis Hamilton records 98th F1 career pole position, Verstappen P3

28 November 2020 at 15:10
Last update 28 November 2020 at 15:14
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  • Matt Gretton
  • Editor-in-Chief

Lewis Hamilton has qualified on pole for the 2020 Bahrain Grand Prix. Under the floodlights, Hamilton stormed to his 98th career pole, his 10th of the current F1 season. The seven-time World Champion leads a Mercedes front-row lockout, the 11th of the 2020 season. Max Verstappen rounds out the top three, while Alex Albon starts from fourth. 

After the first run in Q3, Hamilton led the way with Verstappen splitting the two Mercedes. Sergio Perez, two weeks on from his 2nd place, put in a strong lap to reach P4, while Pierre Gasly rounded out the top five. 

After the second run, Alex Albon improved to fourth pushing Perez down to fifth. And Bottas managed to find some pace to jump Verstappen. 

In terms of the battle for third place in the Constructors' Championship, McLaren lost ground with Carlos Sainz starting from P15 or below. His car stopped out on the track which caused the only red flag of the session. Similar could be said about Racing Point with Stroll failing to reach Q3, but his teammate did make up for it. Both Ferrari drivers are starting from outside the top 10, while Renault have both drivers in the top 10. 

Q1

Hamilton and Bottas led the way at the top of the timesheets after the first run in Q1. Both Williams and both Haas drivers filled the dropzone, alongside Kimi Raikkonen. The pole-sitter at the last Grand Prix, Lance Stroll, sat just outside the dropzone. Charles Leclerc also had some work to do from P15.

Leclerc moved out of danger with a 1:29.137 and Stroll jumped up to P2. Following the chequered flag, Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo found themselves in trouble but both drivers managed to recover with strong laps.

Nicholas Latifi improved but didn't gain any places. The Haas drivers remained in the knockout zone while Russell escaped and Giovinazzi replaced him.

OUT
16th - Giovinazzi
17th - Raikkonen
18th - Magnussen
19th - Grosjean
20th - Latifi

Q2

The only drivers to emerge on the soft tyres were the two AlphaTauri drivers. Everyone else was confident enough to try and start Sunday's race on the medium tyres.

But everyone was quick to head back to the pits after Carlos Sainz stopped out on the track, bringing the red flag out.

The session resumed with nine minutes left on the clock. Verstappen was the first driver to set a lap time with a 1:28.025. His teammate was 0.700 seconds behind. Verstappen's advantage didn't last long, as Hamilton improved on the Dutchman's time by half a second.

With three minutes to go, only six drivers had set lap times. A race on from his maiden pole position, Stroll failed to reach Q3. The two Ferrari cars couldn't get into the top 10 either, but Sebastian Vettel did manage to beat his younger teammate again.

OUT
11th - Vettel
12th - Leclerc
13th - Stroll
14th - Russell
15th - Sainz