Lewis Hamilton “hoped it would be better” for Ferrari in F1 Miami Grand Prix sprint qualifying

Lewis Hamilton has admitted he “hoped it would be better” for Ferrari in sprint qualifying at Formula 1’s Miami Grand Prix.

Ferrari brought an upgrade package to Miami and made a promising start to the weekend as Charles Leclerc topped the only practice session before his impressive pace translated into the early parts of sprint qualifying.

However, Ferrari’s challenge faltered when it mattered most in SQ3, with Leclerc ending up nearly four-tenths adrift in fourth place. Hamilton could only take seventh in the other Ferrari, a further three tenths behind his team-mate.

After sprint qualifying, the seven-time world champion bemoaned the pace of his SF-26.

“We didn’t really know what to expect, I’d hoped that it would be better but yeah, the car didn’t feel particularly great,” Hamilton said.

When asked if the team had expected the upgrades to perform better, the 41-year-old Briton replied: “I have no idea. I thought we would be stronger than we were today.

“We’ll have to do some work overnight to try and figure out why we’re not that quick.

“I was hopeful coming here, positive that we would be much higher but it’s not meant to be.”

Leclerc said Ferrari needs to look into why it struggled for pace after switching onto soft tyres for the pole shoot-out, having been strong on mediums.

“The upgrades are fine, it’s just that everybody brought upgrades,” the Monegasque explained.

“We kind of expected that situation where Mercedes is probably still the car to beat. McLaren did a very big step forward. I felt like they didn’t really optimise their first races of the season. They were always there but they didn’t put everything together.

“On our side, today particularly we struggled with tyres. The medium was working very well but on the softs it wasn’t a nice feeling. So we’ve got to look at it.

“We know that on the race pace we are stronger but in terms of qualifying, there is still some work to be done.”