"Annoying" to be beaten to pole by Hamilton with tiniest of margins - Bottas

Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas was disappointed to miss out on pole position to his team-mate Lewis Hamilton but knows he has the race pace to beat the Briton on Sunday.

Bottas was +0.059 seconds in Q3 with the final sector proving to be the difference between the Finn and Mercedes team-mate Hamilton.

Bottas will start from second place for Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix as Mercedes locked out the front row in Barcelona for a seventh time in eight years.

The Finn explained: "I knew it was going to be close with Lewis as always.

"I think in the end, the first lap he did was really nice and clean, especially sector three. All day today I've been struggling in sector three. It was getting better and better but still not quite good enough.

"Of course, it's annoying but he did a good job and as a team again first row."

In free practice on Friday, Bottas had the best race pace in long-run programmes, with Max Verstappen in second and Hamilton third.

However, the Circuit de Catalunya is a notoriously hard circuit to overtake on and Bottas his best chance of victory is to make a stronger start than Hamilton.

"I think the start will be the best opportunity for me [to overtake Hamilton]," the 30-year-old continued.

"On Friday, a lot of my long runs were competitive so I will have the pace but still, the start will be the best chance."

Currently, Bottas is third in the championship, closely behind Verstappen in second. Hamilton's championship lead over the Dutchman is 30 points.

Before you go...

Hamilton pips Mercedes team-mate Bottas to Spanish Grand Prix pole

Spanish Grand Prix Qualifying - Live Blog!

Related

F1 Features

Mercedes pull Hamilton replacement MASTERSTROKE with new 2025 driver signing

• 2 hours ago

Mercedes

Mercedes announce STUNNING driver comeback in astonishing F1 U-Turn

• December 19, 2024 17:56