Lewis Hamilton bemoaned his inconsistent Mercedes car and the wind which unsettled it and led to an awful Australian Grand Prix qualifying result.

Hamilton failed to reach Q3 in Melbourne and will start Sunday’s race 11th on the grid. And he was baffled by his own inability to extract performance from his car after faring well in practice earlier in the day.

He said: “It felt great in FP3 and it was strange because we were right there with those guys and we didn’t really understand why. But then in qualifying… the inconsistency in the car really messes with the mind.

“George [Russell] did a good job today. It is what it is – I have to try to do a better job tomorrow.” Russell did manage to reach the final part of qualifying and put his own Mercedes seventh on the grid, outqualifying Hamilton for the fourth consecutive time.

Asked what the problems are with his W15, Hamilton replied: “There’s a long list. I think our car is on a bit of a knife edge. In the afternoon the wind picks up here, the same as [it did in] FP2. When the wind picks up the car becomes a lot more unstable.

“This morning was nice with the calmer wind, but ever since the wind picked up it got more unstable. The others seemed to pick up the pace in qualifying, I’m not sure why. But it didn’t feel the same in qualifying even though we had lighter fuel than FP3. It’s not a great feeling for anyone in the team, but we’ll keep working away.”

Team principal Toto Wolff agreed that Mercedes’ cars are still very difficult to set up properly. But he made sure to put across his frustration at his drivers’ results.

This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more

Catch all the action from Formula One on Sky Sports and get exclusive access to races, qualifying and much more for every Grand Prix. From Max Verstappen to Lewis Hamilton, you won’t miss a lap on Sky Sports.

He said: “It’s especially underwhelming because we were within a tenth in FP3. The conditions were a little bit different but there is no excuse. We have a car that’s difficult and you can be narrowly in or out of the window.

Promoted Stories
“As much as I’m annoyed myself about saying this for a long time, we just need to continue working on it. It’s not because of a lack of trying but we are where we are and it’s not good enough.

“It’s an illusion to get closer to Red Bull in the short-term, but I still have to believe there is more in this car. This morning it was not a bad car, but it’s so tricky to go in and out of the performance window and we have to continue to work on it.”