Hamilton grabs pole position at U.S. Grand Prix in title bid

AUSTIN, Texas — Lewis Hamilton warned Ferrari and championship rival Sebastian Vettel would be ready to “punch back” at the U.S. Grand Prix after recent poor results.

He was right. It’s just that Vettel may be too far back to land anything strong enough to deny Hamilton a fifth Formula One championship.

Hamilton drove his Mercedes to his 81st career pole position with a blistering track-record lap of 1 minute, 32.237 seconds at the Circuit of the Americas on Saturday. Vettel was just .061 seconds behind. But instead of starting Sunday’s race from second with a real chance to make it a fight, Vettel will start from fifth because of a three-spot grid penalty issued Friday when race officials said the German drove too fast while under a red flag in a practice session.

That gap could be just big enough to guarantee Hamilton wins the season championship. Hamilton leads Vettel by 67 points and any result Sunday that puts him eight or more points ahead of Vettel clinches the title. If Hamilton wins, Vettel must finish no longer than second to keep the championship alive next week into the Mexican Grand Prix.

A fifth title would tie the British driver with Argentina’s Juan Manuel Fangio, who won five championships in the 1950s. Germany’s Michael Schumacher holds the Formula One record with seven. A win Sunday would also be Hamilton’s 10th of the season. He’s won on this track five of the last six years.

Hamilton refused to get into predictions about Sunday’s outcome.

“We’ve not been getting ahead of ourselves,” Hamilton said. “We have to do the same work as before.”