Lewis Hamilton suffered another blow to his shattered confidence with Ferrari after being knocked out in the first sprint qualifying session ahead of the Qatar Grand Prix.
A week ago in Las Vegas, Hamilton endured arguably the worst qualifying outing of his F1 career when, for the first time, he was the slowest of the field on pure pace alone.
Seven days on, and with an opportunity to repair the damage from that miserable evening, on his final flying lap under the lights at the Lusail International Circuit, Hamilton lost four-tenths of a second in the first sector.
Although the seven-time F1 champion recovered primarily in the middle, by the end of the session, he found himself 18th.
Hamilton finished almost nine-tenths of a second behind the quickest driver in SQ1, Red Bull's Max Verstappen, and four-tenths adrift of team-mate Charles Leclerc.
It was all a far cry from the first sprint of the year in China when Hamilton won the race from pole position.
Aston Martin's Lance Stroll and Liam Lawson in his Racing Bullls start ahead of Hamilton after their SQ1 exits, with Alpine duo Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto on the back row.
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