Hamilton eventually clambered from the cockpit of his car, raising his right
hand to acknowledge he was okay.
Race director Charlie Whiting immediately red-flagged the session, with
Hamilton’s time from his initial hot lap at least good enough to keep him
out of the bottom six at the end of Q1.
With Mercedes confirming a right-front brake disc failure, this was the latest
blow to a man renowned for his speed over one lap.
In Canada, the 29-year-old made minor errors in the final run that allowed
team-mate and title rival Nico Rosberg to claim pole.
A fortnight later at the Austrian Grand Prix, Hamilton made mistakes on both
of his fast laps in Q3, leaving him down in ninth.
And then just two weeks ago in the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, Hamilton
made an error of judgement in changeable conditions, opting to abort his
final run.
Behind him, Rosberg sped by and went on to claim pole again, leaving Hamilton
angry with himself, albeit with redemption on Sunday with a victory to
savour.
Come the end of the middle session, with Hamilton naturally unable to take
part, he qualified 16th.
But with Sauber’s Esteban Gutierrez serving a three-place penalty for an
incident in the last race at Silverstone, Hamilton will start 15th.
Ahead of him in 11th will be McLaren’s Jenson Button and Ferrari’s Kimi
Raikkonen, with Jean-Eric Vergne in his Toro Rosso 13th and Lotus’ Romain
Grosjean 14th.
Behind Hamilton will be Sauber’s Adrian Sutil, then Gutierrez, followed by
Marussia’s Jules Bianchi, with the Frenchman doing a fine job to out-qualify
the Lotus of Pastor Maldonado.
The back three will be the Caterhams of Kamui Kobayashi and Marcus Ericsson
either side of Max Chilton in his Marussia in 21st.
Ericsson’s participation is at the discretion of the stewards as he failed to
set a time due to a hydraulics failure, but it is unlikely to be in doubt.