Hamilton surprised with third place in the grid for Indian Grand Prix

Lewis Hamilton

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he is surprised with his third place in qualification of the Indian Grand Prix. The team secured the second and third place in the grid behind Sebastian Vettel with Nico Rosberg finishing above Hamilton.

“Congratulations to Sebastian that is some serious pace that they have, especially with Webber just behind us on the primes. We have been pushing as hard as we can and we really want to get a good result this weekend and strategy is going to play a huge part. I was a little bit surprised to be where we are, but generally bit-by-bit we have adjusted the set up and got a reasonable balance and hopefully we can push together to try and stay ahead of the rest,” he said.

However, Hamilton ruled out the chances of a win the Grand Prix and said that he could only do so if he manages to get past Vettel in the first turn.

“It is going to be interesting strategy wise. None of us are going to see Sebastian after the first corner unless we jump him at the start which is unlikely, but we will try our best. You saw in the last race that we got a better start than Red Bull, so hopefully it is something like that again, but then you have the long, long straight down the back so you never know how soon to go,” he said.

“The life of the tyre is going to be the big decision to make at the start of the race and other people on other strategies – we will wait and see. I am just going to push as hard as I can and Nico, the team and I really want to get more points than the others,” Hamilton added.