Hamilton: You live and you learn

A wet Saturday at Spa-Francorchamps delivered a cracking qualifying session, packed with incident and talking points in which Hamilton was third quickest.

Behind Verstappen and, incredibly, Mercedes backed George Russell who has done everything possible to convince Toto Wolff he is the driver to be Lewis' teammate next year, today at Spa he has become impossible to ignore.

Nevertheless, it was always going to be a tough ask for Hamilton to beat the Red Bull in Verstappen's hands, in conditions that favoured high downforce packages. The Merc-man's best effort was 0.334s shy of what Max brought to the fight.

Nevertheless from third, with conditions uncertain, Hamilton must fancy his chance of not only achieving the milestone victory but more importantly, certainly for him, to inflict more damage to Verstappen's campaign and, of course, deal with George.

After all the big picture for Lewis has to be the record-breaking eighth F1 title which, when the time comes, will be more a question of how the war was won, not how it was fought as statistics don't lie.

Speaking after the session at Spa, Hamilton said: "It's been a very difficult day for everyone, just trying to stay positive, focused and calm. Max put in a strong lap so well done to him, and George also did a great job.

"For me, my first lap was really good, but I lost some tyre temperature on the slow lap in between my runs, so I think there was a little bit left on the table with that final lap. You live and you learn, and I gave it everything I had today. But we'll look to move forward tomorrow.

"I'm hoping for better weather and a dry day, that'd be great for the fans and also interesting to see where everyone stands with the wing level. We've tried to find the right balance between straight-line speed and downforce.

"It might not have been the best for today, but we'll see tomorrow exactly how good it is. Nevertheless, we'll do everything we can," added Hamilton who leads the championship by eight points after 11 rounds.

Toto Wolff added: "That was a very exciting and dramatic qualifying. It was a difficult session, and it is always tricky to predict the weather here, especially when it is coming in and out so fast.

"In the end, we can be satisfied with P3 for Lewis and everything is to play for tomorrow. We have a strong race car, perhaps more set up for the dry. If the weather is like this, we might struggle a bit more, but otherwise, I think we should be in for a good race," predicted the Mercedes team boss. (Additional reporting by Agnes Carlier)