Hamilton: Silverstone qualifying "like juggling balls whilst you're on a moving plate"

Lewis Hamilton revelled in the gusty Silverstone conditions to secure the 91st pole position of his Formula 1 career.

Despite spinning in Q2 and causing a brief moment of panic on the Mercedes pit wall, Hamilton was able to recover to land his seventh British Grand Prix pole.

"This track is just awesome because with the gusting wind you have a head-wind, tail-wind and cross-wind at different parts of the circuit," said Hamilton. "It's like juggling balls whilst you're on a moving plate and at high speed."

While Q3 was near-perfect, Q2 was anything but given the spin that caused a red flag as Hamilton's W11 sprayed gravel across the circuit.

"Qualifying is a lot about confidence-building and damn, I had that spin," explained Hamilton.

"I was already down through the first section every lap and I don't know how but, with some deep breaths [I] managed to compose myself.

"Q3 started off the right way. It still wasn't perfect the first lap but was still a really clean lap, and the second one even better."

Hamilton's time of one minute 24.303secs was three-tenths of a second clear of Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas, seven-tenths ahead of the Finn's lap record from last season's qualifying, and a second up on third-on-the-grid Max Verstappen.

The six-time F1 champion added: "There's a relatively big gap obviously between us and third place but that doesn't matter.

"At the end of the day, Valtteri is pushing me right to the limit, and he's been doing such a fantastic job all weekend."

Related

More F1 news

Latest F1 news

Charles Leclerc lifts the lid on second wedding with Alexandra Saint Mleux

• 38 minutes ago

FIA president calls for V8 return in huge F1 overhaul

• 1 hour ago

F1 2026: Contract details for every driver including when they expire

• 1 hour ago

Inside Monaco’s wealth: The F1 race like no other – worth €100 MILLION plus much more

• 1 hour ago

Ferrari have chosen their guy for F1 glory and it is not Lewis Hamilton

• 2 hours ago

LEGO just released two new signed F1 sets in time for the Monaco Grand Prix

• 3 hours ago