Lewis Hamilton takes 100 pole position in F1 Car News

Lewis Hamilton broke another record, securing his 100th pole position in Formula 1 in today’s qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix.

With this milestone, the Mercedes-Benz driver extends his own record-breaking race – he surpassed Michael Schumacher’s total of 68 poles in 2017 at the Italian GP. Hamilton hit his remarkable statistic with 270 race entries.

It had looked like his rival Max Verstappen might have rained down on his parade, as the Dutchman had a blistering time in Q2 which was a few tenths off one of the Mercedes drivers at this point. But as often with Hamilton, he clocked in the lap when needed, setting a time of 16.741 in the first part of Q3 that no other driver could improve for the remainder of the session.

Red Bull’s Verstappen lines up second on the grid, with Hamilton teammate Valteri Bottas third. It was a remarkably tight qualifying session, with the drivers failing to make the cut by the smallest of margins. Lando Norris and George Russell, the other Brits in the race, are 10th and 15th respectively.

The century of pole positions is another remarkable record in Hamilton’s career. He already has seven F1 world titles (tying Schumacher’s record) and is aiming for an eighth this year.

Hamilton is approaching 100 GP wins (currently out of 97, six ahead of Schumacher), has most podiums, most laps led, most site wins (tied with Schumacher), most poles on one site (tied with Schumacher and Ayrton Senna), best qualifying lap ever (164.267 mph at last year’s Italian GP). Even statistics as obscure as most of the races in which he has led at least one lap are the property of the British driver.

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