'So sorry, guys': Lewis Hamilton knocked out of Saudi Arabian GP qualifying

Lewis will be starting at the 16th position when the lights go green at the Jeddah Corniche racing circuit on Sunday

Lewis Hamilton has been knocked out in the first qualifying session of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. 

This is the first time since 2017 that the Mercedes driver has failed to qualify in top 10. After his exit from qualifying, Hamilton was heard over the radio telling his pit crew, "So sorry, guys."

Lewis will be starting at the 16th position when the lights go green at the Jeddah Corniche racing circuit on Sunday. Following his exit, Hamilton said, "I was struggling with the balance of the car."

The Mercedes had been struggling for pace in the third qualifying session, but nobody expected Hamilton to end up at 16th position. Interestingly, Hamilton's teammate George Russell managed to make it to the next round of qualifying. 

The setback for Lewis Hamilton comes ahead of what is his 180th Grand Prix with the Mercedes team. With this, he will surpass the partnership between Micheal Schumacher and Ferrari.

Talking about his performance of his Mercedes on Friday, Hamilton had said, "We have issues and we are fighting to fix them. I think there's a lot of potential in our car and we are just trying to work as hard as we can to rectify them as quickly as possible. And we've seen the amazing performance of some of the other teams, how close it is between all of us. And so I am hopeful that week on week we will improve." 

Stating that he was raring to get in the fight as soon as possible, Hamilton said that the team needed to move forward as fast as we can.