Lewis Hamilton blames Madrid F1 pole-miss on "dodgy tyres"

Lewis Hamilton blamed a set of "dodgy tyres" for his fourth-place qualifying result at the Spanish Grand Prix. 

The Ferrari driver has been towards the top of the order all weekend in Madrid, and led the way after the first runs in Q3, putting himself on provisional pole. 

While he was able to improve on his final lap, he couldn't find the pace unlocked by those around him, as he dropped behind surprise pole-winner Lando Norris, Kimi Antonelli, and Max Verstappen.

Speaking on team radio on his cooldown lap, Hamilton told Ferrari: “It’s a dodgy set of tyres. Sorry guys, I gave it everything.”

Hamilton had ended the final practice session in the wall; crashing at the final corner before attempting to drag his damaged Ferrari back to the pits despite warnings from his team to stop the car. 

Facing the media after the conclusion of the session, he added: "[The] car felt pretty awesome in Q3 run one, and then just didn't have any more grip or power in that last lap."

He added: "[The] second lap was just as good as the other one, because [it was] the same time, pretty much. I think I was a little bit, half a tenth, quicker or something like that.

"For some reason, we went into that last lap, and as I came around the last corner, I had understeer, and I was like, 'Yeah, maybe these front tyres are not switched on.'

"It just turns out I just had more rear and more understeer through the lap."

Hamilton lines up one place ahead of team-mate Charles Leclerc, who is running an older spec power unit as a result of his crash in the Italian Grand Prix last time out. 

Despite this, there has been little to separate the two across the weekend, with this again proving to be the case on Saturday. 

"[I'm] not very happy," Leclerc told Sky Sports. 

"There's only a tenth and a half that separates us from the pole. Knowing that everything is about qualifying here, most likely, it's going to be a bit of a difficult race tomorrow. 

"However, we'll do our best preparation. Tyre degradation is going to be key, probably more than any other races this season, considering what we've seen in free practices. So, we'll have to be on it and maximise what we've got."