Valterri Bottas bounces back after a late tyre failure last weekend to claim Pole Position ahead of team-mate and championship leader Lewis Hamilton as Nico Hulkenberg impresses for Racing Point to qualify in 3rd.
8th August 2020
Bottas, who topped the first of three practice sessions on Friday, traded fastest times with Hamilton throughout qualifying with the Finn managing to pip his team-mate by less than a tenth on his final lap in Q3.
Bottas's second Pole Position of the year comes just days after the news that he will be staying at Mercedes for 2021.
Hamilton, who's won the last three races, has a thirty point lead in the championship after he managed to get his car to the end of the race despite only having three tyres for only half of the final lap.
The biggest surprise of the session was Nico Hulkenberg who's once again deputising for regular driver Sergio Perez who is still in quarantine after failing two Covid-19 tests.
The German had been quick in all of the practice sessions leading up to qualifying and was able to put his Racing Point in 3rd and less than a second behind Bottas's Mercedes. His team-mate, Lance Stroll will line up in 6th.
Red Bull's Max Verstappen lines-up in 4th with team-mate Alexander Albon in 9th after putting in a much-improved lap to get him into Q2 after a poor first-lap attempt.
Renault's Daniel Ricciardo qualified in 5th and he hopes that the new upgrades that the French team have brought for this weekend will enable the team to fight for 3rd in the Constructors Championship.
His team-mate, Esteban Ocon, just missed out on a spot in Q3, qualifying in 11th.
It was a baffling performance from Ferrari with Charles Leclerc extracting the maximum from his car to line-up in 8th with team-mate and four-time World Champion Sebastian Vettel still struggling round the Silverstone circuit to qualify in 12th.
After excelling last weekend, McLaren endured a more difficult qualifying session with Lando Norris qualifying in 10th with Carlos Sainz Jr getting knocked-out in Q2 in 13th.
For the fourth time in five races this season, George Russell managed to get his Williams in Q2 with the Brit lining-up in 15th for the Grove team. His team-mate, Nicholas Latifi improved on last weekend's qualifying performance and will start in 18th.
Latifi was just +0.003s ahead of the first of two Alfa Romeo's of Antonio Giovinazzi with Kimi Raikkonen qualifying the slowest of the twenty drivers.