Hamilton expecting "difficult” recovery from 11th in Turkish GP

The seven-time world champion qualified fastest at Istanbul Park ahead of Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas and title rival Max Verstappen but will start Sunday’s race from 11th due to taking a new engine. 

Hamilton will be on the same medium compound tyre as the majority of the drivers in front of him, with only Yuki Tsunoda running softs in Q2, while Aston Martin driver Sebastian Vettel will have a free tyre choice after finishing 11th in qualifying. 

“It was really tricky, the session, in general, because there were still some damp patches and getting the temperatures in the tyres on the first lap wasn’t easy,” Hamilton said. 

“But it was a really great job by the team. I’m so happy with the performance in terms of us getting us out on time. Tomorrow is going to be difficult, but I’ll give it everything.” 

Hamilton, who holds a two-point championship lead over Verstappen, is expecting a tough Sunday afternoon and fears who could become stuck behind a train of cars amid a competitive midfield, as was the case in Sochi last time out. 

“It’s not the easiest for overtaking and we are all on the same tyres as well, so I imagine it’s going to be difficult to move up,” Hamilton admitted. 

“You saw in the last race with Max that it got difficult to move up when he got to six place or something, and vice versa,” he added. “But we’ve got the long straight at the back. Hopefully we can give the fans here a great race.” 

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff acknowledged that “progress will be a tough one” for Hamilton. 

“On the negative side it’s a weekend where we could have had a front-row lockout and we haven’t,” he told Sky. 

"He needs to go to back and it’s not going to be easy with all the cars running medium in front of him apart from Tsunoda. Progress will be a tough one.” 

Asked whether the pace advantage of Mercedes will be enough in the race, Wolff said: “I hope so but yesterday in the long run at a certain stage we were behind a Haas and also a Williams, so it was very difficult to come close. 

"I guess that strategy is going to be the one that helps.”