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Question: Lewis, you left it to the last gasp but you have got your first pole of the season and the Red Bull stranglehold of qualifying has been broken and you pushed your car home as a celebration.
Lewis Hamilton: Yes, it has been a great day and a great start to the weekend. It is just a bit overwhelming really for me. So many memories came back when they told me on the radio just now that I had pole position. It just reminded me of my first grand prix win here and my first pole position here back in 2007, so a very special day. I am just really proud of my guys to be honest as I damaged the car a little bit in practice and they fixed it in no time. Seriously professional. I owe it all to them really and this is really a reflection of their hard work.
Question: Lewis, give us your thoughts on the race tomorrow, particularly in light of what these guys have been saying about the tyres. Are you confident that you have got the right thing for tomorrow?
Lewis Hamilton: I think the key is you need to take each day one at a time and clearly today we wanted to get as far up at the front as possible. For sure yesterday when we were testing the option tyre was not the best. It goes off quite quickly but we are going to do everything we can to maintain them. I think you might see a completely different race unfold tomorrow. There are possibilities, as always with every race here, of safety cars, so that’s to be expected, so I guess you have to be quite fortunate when they do and do not come out. I think these guys are in quite a fortunate position with the tyres they are on but who knows the track might improve and the option tyre might end up being the best one but I think we will have a good race tomorrow and, you know, we have just got to keep our heads down.
Question: Lewis, what about that statistic third consecutive pole here and also bringing to an end the run of poles for Red Bull Racing this year…
Lewis Hamilton: I think it is fantastic for the team. I think it is a result of continued hard work for the guys and progression. It is great to come back here. I saw that second to last lap that Mark had gone ahead and I was so fortunate that the guys came across the radio and said that I had another chance to get another lap in. But it is great for us to at least split these guys. That’s what we have been working on for quite a long time. I think tomorrow is another day but today is a great result and I am very, very happy.
Question: Quite a margin as well in fact, about a quarter-of-a-second. What do you think of that?
Lewis Hamilton: I think generally every time we have done a lap here it has been good gap like that. I am definitely surprised to see it. I didn’t know what time these guys had done. Definitely surprised to see the lap times. I did a 15.5, I think, which is quite a good lap. I don’t know where I found all the time but I knew it was there, so just very happy. No matter how it feels, just a small amount ahead, but this is perfect for us.
Question: You mentioned just now about the mechanics fixing something for you?
Lewis Hamilton: Yes, the mechanics did… I saw them at work today like I have never seen them before. It was just like watching an orchestra. It was amazing. They did such a fantastic job. After P3 I just clipped the wall out of turn four and there was a little bit of a heavy feeling. I think it was the bearing on the front right and we didn’t risk it and changed the front and rear corner just to be sure. Nothing was broken, but just to be sure and they did an incredible job to do that in the 40 or 45 minutes before pulling up to qualifying. I think it was quite impressive.
Question: Now yesterday a lot of people would say McLaren were really in trouble with the tyres. What has changed overnight? The circuit as well as the car?
Lewis Hamilton: Yesterday we were in a lot of trouble for sure. Through practice P1 felt quite good and then I think as we went into P2 people were switching on their tyres a little better than we were and the car was all over the place. Also the set-up we had gone to was not in the right direction for me but last night we sat down for quite a long time and made really good steps and I was very optimistic with the changes that I made last night. Got in the car this morning and it felt pretty good and so we were just very fortunate today the car was working and we just did a good job.
Question: Lewis, is it fair to say that you and the team are taking a major gamble for tomorrow with a) the tyre choice and b) your banking on a safety car, so that you can dive into the pits early to change the tyres?
Lewis Hamilton: I don’t think so. I don’t personally feel so because every race you’re taking gambles really. I don’t think we’ve gone into it thinking we should gamble this. It was just our feeling. I think both tyres are very, very close. I chose to go with the option tyre. Of course we know that the option tyre doesn’t last as long as the prime but generally through the race weekend the option tyre does actually get better, so that degradation should not be as bad as yesterday on a dirty circuit. Of course if a safety car comes round it could help but we’re going to see how long they last and do the best job we can with them. You never know what the strategies are tomorrow. I think it’s going to be interesting to see everyone’s strategy.
Question: Does it worry you that you will have to make a pit stop very early and then you will do a lot of laps with hard tyres on a track where tyres are very demanding?
Lewis Hamilton: I’m not worried right now, I’m just enjoying the fact that I just got pole position. Later on, for sure, we will sit back and analyse the different situations we could find ourselves in tomorrow but of course the obvious thing is just not to panic on the way and do the best job we can. I don’t know what the other guys behind us have done but I think there are a lot of people in a similar position. It could work either way for these guys, it could work or it may not, who knows?
Question: Lewis, that was an amazing last lap. What about the drama of that, just explain to us what it was like?
Lewis Hamilton: The lap? Yeah, I can’t really remember being in a similar position. I went out with the plan to do one lap on the tyres. The first run was quite good, not such a bad lap. I thought it was quite smooth and then the second attempt is always the tricky one. This is a very tough circuit, it’s not particularly flowing and you need to make sure you hit the kerbs in the right places etc. On the lap that was supposed to be my last lap I touched a kerb a little bit too much in turn eight or something which lost me a lot of time. Clearly I wasn’t able to improve on the time and then I saw on the screen that Mark had gone ahead. I didn’t know exactly where I’d fallen to but I realised that I needed to go again and fortunately the guys said there was enough fuel for us to do that – just. So I was very, very happy with the final lap. I couldn’t have asked for more.
Question: Lewis, just talk us through the coming-in lap. Have you ever had to push the car like that before?
Lewis Hamilton: It was actually great. It gave me more time to… I had to slow down, it gave me time to wave. There is so much support here from all the fans. There are a lot of Vodafone McLaren Mercedes supporters here, there are a lot of British flags here. Every time I come here the support is absolutely immense. So it gave me a little bit of time to firstly acknowledge them and then I switched the car off and I was rolling. I got out and started pushing it and it felt great actually. It was quite a unique experience and I’m sure I won’t forget it.
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Formula 1: Lewis Hamilton Claims Pole For Canadian Grand Prix
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