Hamilton proud: 'Good bit off Max's time'

Lewis Hamilton has an excellent starting point for the Belgian Grand Prix. He qualified fourth, but moves up to third starting position because of Max Verstappen's grid penalty. Speaking to various media, including GPblog, he shares his expectations for Sunday's race.

Hamilton assesses chances for Belgian GP

"At the end still a good chunk off Max, pretty impressive, but I'm really happy with the result that we got.," Hamilton told reporters after qualifying.

The Mercedes driver is hoping for a podium finish, but at the same time realises that will not be an easy task. "I guess I have Max behind but yeah, that would be the goal of course, to chase those guys down," he continued.

Qualifying was extra tricky because hardly any driving was possible in the rained-out free practice on Friday. According to Hamilton, that makes it difficult to estimate what the proportions will be on Sunday. "P1 no one really got any running, it was just wet running so getting the setup ready for qualifying today was especially hard, it's just like a big guessing game and so I'm hoping that the car's decent and over the long run tomorrow in the race but so far it's a good start."