Pole position ensures Lewis keeps pressure on Rosberg at Interlagos
LEWIS HAMILTON heaped the pressure on championship rival Nico Rosberg yesterday by claiming pole position for today’s Brazilian Grand Prix.
Hamilton has never won at Interlagos, but knows he must finish ahead of his Mercedes team-mate in Sunday’s race to take the title battle on to the final round of the season in Abu Dhabi.
And the 31-year-old Briton edged out Rosberg in a nailbiting qualifying session here on Saturday to secure what could prove to be a pivotal pole as he bids to keep his slim championship hopes alive.
Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen will line up in third with Max Verstappen of Red Bull fourth on the grid.
Rosberg will be crowned Formula One’s 33rd world champion on Sunday if he wins in Brazil for a third successive year.
But the German would appear to have his work cut out with Hamilton, a winner of the last two races in America and Mexico, maintaining his fine form.
Hamilton has never won at the birthplace of his boyhood hero and triple-world
champion, Ayrton Senna, but the Briton gave himself every chance of breaking that duck with another fine performance yesterday.
The heavy rain forecast for the one-hour qualifying session failed to materialise with Hamilton’s quickest lap 0.102 seconds faster than his championship rival.
Hamilton and Rosberg traded blows in their final runs, but it was the Briton, courtesy of a better second and third sectors of this Interlagos track, who claimed the 60th pole of his career.
“I felt quite comfortable in qualifying as I have done all through the weekend,” said Hamilton, who is wearing a one-off tribute helmet in honour of Senna this weekend.
“Nico generally has been going quicker as the weekend has gone on, but generally I have had it covered.”
Rosberg added: “Lewis was just marginally quicker in the end. Anyway, as we have seen this year, pole is not the guy who will necessarily win the race.”
Elsewhere, Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo will start fifth and sixth with Romain Grosjean an impressive seventh for Haas.