Hamilton in pole as Button says he needs break
LEWIS Hamilton extended his dominance of the Italian Grand Prix into a third successive year by claiming an emphatic pole position ahead of his championship rival Nico Rosberg.
The triple world champion, who is bidding to become the first driver since Juan Manuel Fangio in the 1950s to secure a hat-trick of consecutive wins at Monza, was incredibly nearly half-a-second faster than Rosberg.
In securing the 56th pole of his career, Hamilton also joined his great hero Ayrton Senna and the aforementioned Fangio to claim a record five poles at the so-called Temple of Speed.
Sebastian Vettel, in front of the partisan Italian crowd, will start from third on the grid with his Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen alongside him on the second row.
The records are continuing to fall for Hamilton, and with a nine-point advantage over Rosberg, the Stevenage-born racer is now the odds-on favourite to join only a handful of drivers to win four titles come the end of the season.
Hamilton, 31, was at his dominant best at Monza yesterday, with Rosberg, who won from the front in Belgium last Sunday, a distant and demoralising second.
Should Hamilton carry his decisive form into today’s race, Rosberg will head to Singapore with a deficit of at least 16 points. Rosberg once led this championship by a margin of 43 but, with the momentum stacked in Hamilton’s favour, that will seem like an age ago to the German now.
Meanwhile, Jenson Button, who will start a lowly 15th on the grid, is ready to step down from Formula One racing after announcing he will take a sabbatical in 2017.
The 36-year-old McLaren driver, who won the World Championship in 2009, has competed in every Grand Prix season since the turn of the century.
But following a career which has yielded nearly 300 starts, 15 victories and 50 podiums, Button announced on the eve of the Italian Grand Prix that he will not participate in the sport in a full-time capacity next year.
The Englishman, who will be replaced by McLaren’s highlyrated reserve driver Stoffel Vandoorne, will instead take on an ambassador role.
But he could yet return to the grid in 2018 after revealing McLaren has an option to put him back in the car.
“You are not just a racing driver when you drive in F1 – this is your life – and I definitely need a break from that in 2017,” said Button.