Lewis Hamilton qualified sixth for Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix; Mercedes team-mate George Russell starts eighth; Mercedes performed strongly in wet practice on Friday and showers are forecast for the race; watch Sunday's race live on Sky Sports F1 at 6am
Saturday 8 October 2022 23:34, UK
Lewis Hamilton has admitted Mercedes' hopes of success in Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix will be heavily influenced by the weather, with rain potentially aiding the Brit.
Hamilton qualified sixth on Saturday in Suzuka as Max Verstappen took pole, with Mercedes unable to keep pace with Red Bull and Ferrari, leaving them to share the third and fourth rows with Alpine as George Russell could only manage eighth.
However, Mercedes did impress on Friday in wet conditions as Russell led second practice from Hamilton, and with more rain forecast for Sunday, the seven-time world champion did offer some optimism.
"It depends on the conditions that we have," Hamilton said.
"If it rains, I think we didn't look too bad yesterday in the wet conditions. I think either way we should be a little bit closer than we were today, and I'm just hoping for a better race result than we had last week."
Hamilton put together a run of five successive podium finishes either side of F1's summer break, but has since gone four races without one, finishing ninth last weekend in Singapore.
Despite being hopeful that rain could improve Mercedes' chances, he insisted that competing for a first Mercedes win of the season is highly unlikely.
"We were losing a lot of time on the straights but the car was feeling really good throughout the rest of the lap," Hamilton said.
"It was fun and my laps were generally good, I didn't have any problems otherwise. I think we losing something like five or six tenths just on the straight.
"We kind of anticipated it going in - we have a bigger wing than the other guys.
"I think that's a real reach to try to say that we can get a win, those guys are nine tenths ahead. You don't go from being nine tenths behind in qualifying to winning a race."
Russell had outpaced Hamilton throughout qualifying and for much of the weekend, but was outperformed by his more experienced team-mate in the crucial final moments of qualifying.
While Hamilton starts behind Esteban Ocon, Russell is behind the other Alpine of Fernando Alonso.
"It's definitely not where we hoped to be qualifying," Russell said. "Sixth and eighth on the grid, it's not our finest day for sure. We're probably slightly further off the pace than we anticipated.
"We didn't quite expect to be in the fight with Red Bull and Ferrari, but ahead of this weekend we weren't expecting to be fighting with Alpine.
"We've got a lot of work to do overnight to try to move forward. I'm confident we can move forward, but unfortunately with the pace we have, I don't think we're in the fight with Red Bull and Ferrari."
Along with the possibility of rain, Mercedes' other big hope going into the race is that a surface that is tough on tyres may suit them.
One of few areas where Mercedes have sometimes been stronger than Red Bull and Ferrari this season has been tyre degradation, and Russell believes the abrasive nature of the Suzuka track could aid his race.
"I think we'll definitely have better pace tomorrow," Russell added.
I think the tyre degradation, this has been our strength all year, it looked very difficult this morning in practice.
"Maybe it will be close between a one and a two-stop, but most likely there'll be more pit stops than not - we need to do something different to the top guys."
