Lewis Hamilton clinches pole position number 102. The seven time world champion was the only one to go under 1.21s in Qatar, giving a gap of 0.455s to title rival Max Verstappen - the largest gap in a dry qualifying session of the year. 

The Briton didn't feel at ease with the W12 during Friday's free practice, where he could only set the fourth fastest time overall. After a night of work and a weel deserved sleep - Lewis flew all over the world during the week - Hamilton was ready to attack and take pole number 76 with Mercedes. The last time he finished on pole in Hungary, as in Brazil he was just the 'King of speed' on Friday. 

Tomorrow Mercedes will put both drivers on medium, and so will Red Bull with Max Verstappen: the Dutch man will have no defense, as Sergio Perez failed to get to Q3; plus, Verstappen will be on the dirty side of the track. 

"I’m very happy with that qualifying session. Yesterday was difficult for me, I wasn’t feeling well on Thursday or Friday and then struggled in practice - revealed Hamilton - so, I had to dig deep, I was here late last night working with the engineers and we found a lot of areas to improve. I felt fantastic today and slept very well last night, which made a big difference.

Pole number 102 for @LewisHamilton 👊

In spectacular fashion too 🙌#QatarGP 🇶🇦 #F1 pic.twitter.com/hUW9jOc4V6

— Formula 1 (@F1) November 20, 2021

"We made some changes for FP3 and it seemed to work, and I was able to carry that into qualifying. That last lap was just beautiful, this track is amazing to drive and very fast, all medium and high-speed corners - he continued - in terms of the race, we don’t have much experience at this track, but I don’t think it will be the easiest of circuits to follow. It’s also not massively degrading the tyres so it could be a one or a two stop, we’ll find out tomorrow. It’s a decent run down to Turn 1 and it’s nice and wide, so we’ll be giving it everything".