Hamilton blasts Mercedes car as ‘undriveable’ in five-year low

JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia: Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton described his Mercedes car as “undriveable” on Saturday after qualifying only 16th on the grid for Sunday’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. It was the first time since the 2017 Brazilian Grand Prix, where he crashed, that he had failed to progress from the Q1 section of a qualifying session and the first time since 2009 in Britain for only speed and performance reasons. “Of course, I am very disappointed,” said Hamilton, who apologized to the team.

“We have a serious issue — something in the set-up — and it was looking good in P3 (practice) so I tried to progress further in a similar direction, but maybe went too far. “The car was so nervous it was undriveable.” Hamilton started the inaugural Saudi Arabian race on pole position last December and has a record 103 poles in his career. His new Mercedes team-mate and fellow-Briton George Russell qualified sixth, but said he was also struggling with the car designed this year to meet new regulations.

Russell said the team did not understand the new car yet, but believed it had great potential which needed to be unlocked. “For the team, it’s not a good day. We don’t have a handle on the car at the moment and it has been inconsistent.