Hamilton suffers brutal career-first blow in Las Vegas quali

Lewis Hamilton will start Saturday night’s Las Vegas Grand Prix 20th and last on the grid after lacking the pace needed to progress in a wet session on Friday.

Hamilton crossed the line with a 1:57.115, putting him over three-tenths down on Red Bull’s Yuki Tsunoda, who will start 19th.

Lewis Hamilton on his ‘horrible’ P20 in qualifying

As the rain came down at Sin City on Friday night, the drivers had to deal with a tricky qualifying session where visibility was minimal, as was tyre temperature on the full wet Pirellis.

Putting in a final run near the end of Q1, Hamilton‘s build-up was undone when he clattered into a bollard at Turn 14.

“This was with two minutes to go,” former F1 driver Anthony Davidson told Sky F1. “He’s got, I think this is [Alex] Albon in front of him, but I don’t know where he was placing the car, but he seems to have just run over this cone.

“Maybe he’s looking down at his dash or something… He’s obviously trying to position, but randomly hits the cone.

“So that could explain why there was this lack of performance, probably, towards the end for him. So he starts to build up that penultimate lap with two minutes to go, but if that cone had found its way under the car – and the car did not look good, I must say, through Turn 17.”

Wrecking his warm-up lap, it only got worse for the Briton from there.

“As bad as it gets,” he told the media. “I couldn’t see anything. I hit the bollard, I couldn’t see it.”

More on qualifying in Las Vegas

👉 Las Vegas GP: Norris grabs pole in a wet quali as Leclerc spin compromises Piastri

👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates

Despite being in the drop zone, Hamilton was confident he could progress as his Ferrari felt good in Saturday’s final practice.

“The car was feeling great in FP3, I was really, really excited that we’d finally have a good day,” he revealed.

However, a yellow flag on his final lap cost him dearly.

“I had a yellow flag in the last corner, and then going into Turn 17, there was a yellow flag, so I had to lift,” he said. “But I didn’t have the grip anyway, so I don’t think it would have made much difference.”

The seven-time World Champion will, barring drama or penalties for other racers, line up at the very back of the Las Vegas grid on Saturday night.

Brutal quali for Lewis Hamilton 😞 pic.twitter.com/nbWSc7wbBe

— ESPN F1 (@ESPNF1) November 22, 2025

Asked for his overriding feelings about that, he replied: “I don’t really have an answer for that.

“It obviously feels horrible, it doesn’t feel good.

“But all I can do, I just got to let it go by and try and come back tomorrow.

“I’ve done everything I could possibly do in terms of preparation.

“All the practice sessions, we were feeling amazing in FP3 and I just didn’t get a lap at the end.

“I felt like we were quickest, and then you come out of qualifying 20th.

“This year is definitely the hardest year.”

Asked if he had a “decent” car to fight back in the race, he said: “We can try tomorrow, we’ve got a really good car. It’s going to be really hard to come back from 20th.”

Read next: FIA confirms double Mercedes verdict after Las Vegas Grand Prix investigation