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October 21, 2018 – Lewis Hamilton could secure his fifth world title in Formula 1 on Sunday. The Briton won pole position for the US Grand Prix on Saturday by driving a 1.32.237 in qualifying, while rival Sebastian Vettel had to start the race with a penalty on the grid. Max Verstappen was damaged during the first part of the qualifying session and started in Austin at the age of 13.
It was already clear that Vettel would not start the eighteenth race of the 2018 Formula 1 season from the start. The German was ridden at the first training during a red code, for which he was penalized with a grid of three places. Hamilton is world champion in Formula 1 Sunday for the fifth time, while he scores eight points more than the Ferrari driver.
Q1
Hamilton started the qualifying session with a record of 1.34.130, the best time in Q1. Valtteri Bottas put his Mercedes in second place in the standings with a 1.34.518, while Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen were third and fourth with 1.34.569 and 1.34.703. Max Verstappen scored for the sixth time, but later in the first quarter, he hit a major hurdle in the fifteenth corner, after which something broke in the car and could not be repaired for the first time. second trimester. The Dutchman has thus become fifteenth in qualifying, but can inflict Sunday a penalty in thirteenth place for both Toro Rosso.
Fernando Alonso finished with a sixteenth time after Q1. Sergey Sirotkin, Lance Stroll, Marcus Ericsson and Stoffel Vandoorne were also too slow to continue qualifying. However, they are still on the grid because of penalties on the grid that Toro Rosso drivers have received for changing engine.
Q2
Four drivers came out in supersoft T2 to try to qualify the hardest tire of the race: Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas and Daniel Ricciardo. They drove the second, third, fourth and fifth time on this subject. Kimi Raikkonen came out with the ultrasoft and clocked the fastest time in 1.32.884. Vettel, Hamilton and Bottas returned to ultrasoft at the end of the second quarter as a precaution. Ricciardo did not do this remarkably well, but in the end, all the times on the tires marked in red proved to be good enough to occupy the previously occupied positions in the time table.
Because of the problem encountered in Verstappen, one of the five abandonments at the beginning of the second quarter was already known. Pierre Gasly and Brendon Hartley also did not have time to speak because of the motor punishment they had to undergo. The Toro Rosso duo begins Sunday on the Circuit des Amériques. The battle for the last places in Q3 was very exciting, with four drivers in a tenth of a second. Carlos Sainz Jr. has finally come to the short end by winning two thousandths less than his team-mate Renault, Nico Hulkenberg, and finishing 11th in the second quarter. Haas driver Kevin Magnussen also finished with a twelfth time.
Q3
Hamilton led the battle for pole with a 1.32.567. Vettel slowed down a tenth with a 1.32.655, while Bottas managed the third time with a 1.32.686 on a few hundredths of the German. Raikkonen continued with a knife attack in 1.33.024 at the fourth time.
At the start of the second innings, Raikkonen announced on the radio that it was starting to rain, but the drivers could simply finish qualifying on a dry circuit. The Finn took the lead with a 1.32.307, but Hamilton had a better lap with a 1.32.237. Vettel then crossed the finish line in 1.32.298, which allowed him to take second place at halftime. The penalty of three places on the grid means that he is fifth on the grid on Sunday. Raikkonen moved to second starting position, while Bottas and Ricciardo occupied the second row in Austin.
Esteban Ocon finished sixth and is next to Vettel on the starting grid. Nico Hulkenberg, Romain Grosjean, Charlec Leclerc and Sergio Perez complete the top ten of the grid.
The US Grand Prix begins Sunday at 20:10.
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