Karun Chandhok heard something in Lewis Hamilton onboard that ‘most drivers’ don’t have to deal with

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Lewis Hamilton has now endured back-to-back Q1 exits for the first time with Ferrari, after he bowed out of qualifying for the 2025 F1 Qatar Grand Prix in P18 on Saturday.

The 40-year-old has also finished both of the qualifying sessions held in Lusail this weekend in P18. Ferrari also watched Hamilton qualify P18 for the F1 Sprint in Qatar on Friday, before the Briton started the 100km dash on Saturday from the pit lane and he only finished in P17.

Hamilton could only post a 1:22.043 during SQ1 on Friday, when Alpine duo Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto were the only drivers to set slower lap times. The seven-time F1 champion improved his lap time to a 1:20.907 in Q1 this Saturday, but he was 0.254s shy of the cut-off.

Only Lance Stroll of Aston Martin and Alpine’s Colapinto set slower lap times than Hamilton during Q1 by 0.151s and 0.230s respectively. His Ferrari teammate, Charles Leclerc, finished the first phase of qualifying for the Qatar GP in P9 with a personal-best lap time of 1:20.564.

Lewis Hamilton lacked confidence with his Ferrari in qualifying for the Qatar Grand Prix

Karun Chandhok immediately noticed some telling signs from watching Hamilton’s onboard footage from the end of Q1 to explain his early exit from qualifying for the Qatar GP. The ex-HRT driver feels Hamilton lacked the “confidence” in his Ferrari to keep the throttle planted.

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Hamilton regularly had to lift off the throttle around the Lusail International Circuit’s corners where other drivers would push with more ease. The record 104-time polesitter particularly struggled at the right-hand Turns 3 and 4 and the left-hand Turn 6 hairpin on his final Q1 lap.

Chandhok said on Sky Sports F1 (29/11, 18:23): “He just didn’t seem to have the confidence or the grip to attack. Here, through Turns 3 and 4, just listen to the hesitation on the throttle here. It’s multiple stabs.

“He’s got no confidence to just dive through and pick up the throttle exactly where he wants. Then he gets to the hairpin of Turn 6 and, again, just bleeding lap time. You can see a little squirm of oversteer, and that cost another tenth and a bit on his final run.

“Turn 15 is another place where he seemed to lose time when you look at the data. He was just not able to carry the minimum speed.

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“You can see most other drivers through Turn 15 [taking] just a partial lift. Hamilton’s having to really come off the throttle. Real, real frustration for him.”

Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton adds yet another sorry result to his ‘worst season ever’

Ferrari have now watched Hamilton leave a Grand Prix qualifying session in Q1 at successive races, having also only ranked P20 for the Las Vegas GP last week. Hamilton qualified last on pure pace for the first time in his F1 career in Las Vegas, as he struggled amid the heavy rain.

Lusail has not seen any rain, but Hamilton’s problems once again persisted during qualifying in Qatar. His third Q1 exit of the 2025 F1 season to date also adds yet another layer to what Hamilton described as a “nightmare” first year with Ferrari after his retirement in Sao Paulo.

Despite climbing from the back of the grid into P10, before profiting from McLaren’s double disqualification to get P8 in Las Vegas last weekend, Hamilton called 2025 his “worst season ever” in F1. He is set to pen his worst points tally under the scoring system used since 2010.