“Same Saturday as always” - Lewis Hamilton makes familiar “tyres didn’t work” complaint

It was a familiar story for Lewis Hamilton at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix as he struggled for tyre temperature in qualifying.

Hamilton could only secure seventh on the grid in Baku, 0.4s off Mercedes teammate George Russell.

It continued Hamilton’s difficulties on a Saturday, meaning he’s now lost the teammate head-to-head to Russell.

It’s just the second time in his F1 career, after 2014, he’s lost a teammate head-to-head in qualifying.

Hamilton was brief in his analysis after qualifying.

He told Sky Sports: “Same Saturday as always.”

When pressed on the issues he faced, Hamilton added: “Same thing that happens every Saturday.

“Yesterday the car was amazing, felt great. Honestly, I think it could have been at least second row today. Came today, the tyres didn’t work all day.”

Sky Sports pundit Bernie Collins feels like Hamilton was caught out by the drop in track temperature.

She explained that while Mercedes tried different things with their outlaps, Hamilton is “potentially more sensitive” to track conditions.

Collins said: “I think four-tenths off George, he will be really unhappy with that because the first person you’re compared to is your teammate.

“Sure the conditions have changed and he did complain a lot through the session about the tyre temperature. I think they played it a little bit with outlap and the traffic they had. They didn’t get it all together.

“That is difficult to do through this qualifying. Particularly in Q3, the track temperature took a big dip.

“I think that’s what maybe caught Lewis out - he’s potentially more sensitive to that potentially as George got away with it.”