What a Qualifying we’ve had in Hungary. 10 drivers from 8 different teams in Q3, but this time, it was not Max Verstappen who took the Pole position. It was his arch-rival from the pre-2022 days, Lewis Hamilton, that out-qualified him. The Briton showed glimpses of his prime self in the attempt to get on Pole. But according to a former F1 manager, Verstappen was actually 3 tenths quicker than him.

Considering the kind of season that Mercedes was having, Hamilton was not considered being one of the contenders for Pole. But he showed his mastery over the W14 and ended Verstappen’s 5-race Pole streak. The gap between the top 2 was very small. Hamilton was only quicker by 3 thousandths of a second. However, on his YouTube Channel, Peter Windsor analyzed both laps of the two drivers and showed how the Dutchman had more pace than Hamilton.

Windsor said, “But here’s a sting in the tail. If you take Max’s three best sector times from those two runs on the two sets of soft tires in Q3 and you’ll put them alongside Lewis Hamilton’s three best sector times from his two laps, Max would have been on the pole by 0.3 (seconds). The problem was, of course, he didn’t go quickly enough in a couple of areas on the second run. That’s possibly because the car was surprising him.”

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In the end, it was the 7-time champion who came out on top. And he said that even he was not expecting such a result.

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The last time Lewis Hamilton got a Pole position was at the 2021 Saudi Arabian GP. After 33 races, he has finally broken his drought of getting P1 in Qualifying. Even he couldn’t believe that he finally did it. In the post-Qualifying interview, he said that the Pole was an unexpected and “strange” one.

“It feels like my first pole. I know there’s been a lot, and it feels strange to say that. I don’t remember the last time I had a pole.” Hamilton told Sky Sports F1. “We were not expecting that coming into the weekend. We didn’t have an upgrade, we just made small tweaks to the rear and front wing.”

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Finally, the LH army has something to celebrate about. Can Hamilton convert this Pole position into a Podium at the Hungaroring today?