Lewis Hamilton takes pole for Spanish Grand Prix ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Valtteri Bottas

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton topped the qualifying session for the Spanish Grand Prix at the Barcelona Catalunya racetrack in Montmelo, Spain, on May 13, 2017. Manu Fernandez / AP Photo

Lewis Hamilton bounced back to form as he claimed pole position for the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona on Saturday.

The triple world champion had struggled in Russia two weeks ago as he qualified and finished a distant fourth, but his lap of 1 min, 19.149 secs in his Mercedes-GP was enough to top the time sheets in qualifying and claim the 64th pole of his career.

Championship leader Sebastian Vettel was just 0.051 slower in his Ferrari on Saturday, after surviving a scare in the first part of qualifying when he suffered a loss of power in his engine, and was advised to stop the car by his race engineer.

The four-time world champion chose to try to return the car to the pit, and that proved an inspired move as the problem solved itself and Vettel was able to get back up to speed and continue in the session.

Hamilton’s teammate Valtteri Bottas, the race-winner in Russia, was third, ahead of Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen and the two Red Bull Racing cars of Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo.

Surprise of the day came from Fernando Alonso, as despite limited mileage in his McLaren after an engine failure in practice on Friday, the double world champion qualified seventh, 1.8 seconds off Hamilton’s time.

The race, the fifth round of the Formula One season, begins at 4pm UAE time on Sunday.

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