Bidding farewell with a flourish was the optimistic hope for Lewis Hamilton as he entered his final meeting with Mercedes at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix but even fortune, it seems, would not favour the British driver for his swansong where he finished 18th in qualifying.
His final hot lap was scuppered by the poorest of luck as he picked up a stray bollard dislodged by Kevin Magnussen, condemning his finale to probably be something of a slog from the lower reaches of the grid.
At the sharp end, McLaren hold all the cards as they attempt to secure their first constructors’ title since 1998. Lando Norris claimed pole position for the team in the season finale at the Yas Marina circuit with Oscar Piastri in second, ensuring they are in prime position to seal the title.
Hamilton was hugely disappointed to have such a dispiriting end to his final qualifying run with Mercedes, with whom he has taken 78 poles over his 12 seasons and enjoyed unprecedented success, including winning six titles.
The last three seasons have been tough on driver and team and both had hoped for more in Abu Dhabi before the curtain comes down.
“I was the last car on track and ran out of time ultimately, and then I got the bollard at the end which went under the car and I lost all downforce so it couldn’t have gone worse really,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton is carrying the names of 150 fans on his car this weekend to salute the support he has received and will return to the factory in Brackley to bid farewell in person next week. While a win is not likely in Abu Dhabi, when the flag falls it will be a moment that will doubtless resonate strongly with the British driver.
“Every day, and more than ever, I’ve just tried to be really present,” he said. “Just trying to take it in because it’s the last time we will be racing and driving in Silver Arrows and it’s all my wins, all my success through my life, so every moment is a special moment and I would have loved to get a podium for the guys this weekend and it just didn’t work out.”
His team principal, Toto Wolff, had hoped for a celebratory send-off for Hamilton, who will start 16th after grid penalties were applied, but believed the team had been at fault in sending him out too late and amidst traffic. “I need to apologise to Lewis,” he said. “We totally let him down, the idiotic mistake of not going earlier, inexcusable. I am so down at what happened, it was just idiotic.”
For McLaren, who lead Ferrari by 21 points with 44 on the table, a win for either Norris or Piastri would seal it, as would either driver finishing in front of both Ferraris.
“We want to do it in style and we want to win, I want to win,” said Norris. However, while he and Piastri were reluctant to indulge in any chicken-counting, they already have one hand on that first constructors’ title for 26 years. Not least because Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc had his final quick lap in Q2 deleted for exceeding track limits and he finished in 14th. A setback compounded by his 10-place grid penalty for taking a new battery unit and he will start from 19th, all but ending any faint hopes the Scuderia had of securing the title.
It would be no little achievement for McLaren after the revival sparked by the upgrades they brought to the Miami GP, a full 17 races ago in May. They have overcome a 115-point deficit at that stage of the season to take the lead from Red Bull. Their team principal, Andrea Stella, rightly described it as a turnaround that was unthinkable as little as 12 months ago.
They are set to celebrate then, after a long, trying journey back to the front of the grid and have the pace to do it with a real flourish under the floodlights, while Mercedes and Hamilton will end their long relationship perhaps at best with a feisty thrust from the back before the seven-time champion departs to don Ferrari’s scarlet in 2025.
Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz was third and Haas’s Nico Hülkenberg hooked up an excellent lap to take fourth, with Max Verstappen fifth for Red Bull.
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Pierre Gasly was sixth for Alpine, Hamilton’s teammate George Russell was in seventh, Fernando Alonso eighth for Aston Martin, Valtteri Bottas in ninth for Sauber and Sergio Pérez 10th for Red Bull.
Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson were in 11th and 12th for RB, Lance Stroll in 13th for Aston Martin and Magnussen in 15th for Haas.
Alex Albon and Franco Colapinto were in 16th and 19th for Williams but both drivers have five-place grid penalties for using a new gearbox and will start from 18th and 20th respectively. Zhou Guanyu was in 17th for Sauber and Jack Doohan, in his F1 debut, taking over from Esteban Ocon at Alpine for this final race before joining the team full time next season, was in 20th.
