Lewis Hamilton booted out of Belgian GP qualifying as F1 stewards make decision on Brit

Lewis Hamilton was kicked out of the first part of qualifying at the Belgian Grand Prix after the stewards went back and deleted his fastest time for a track limit violation. The seven-time world champion will now line up 16th for the race at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps.

After being punched down to the fringes of the top 15 after the first set of runs, Hamilton put together a lap that left him right below team-mate Charles Leclerc on the timing screens. However, after the stewards looked at his final effort more closely, it was deleted, as he was deemed to have put all four wheels off the track at the top of Raidillon. This meant that he was unable to head out for the second part of qualifying, promoting Gabriel Bortoleto back into play.

This was the latest development in a miserable weekend to date for the legendary Brit. Hamilton was knocked out in SQ1 on Friday after spinning at the final chicane due to rear brake locking.

Starting the sprint race from the bottom end of the grid, Hamilton's hopes of scoring points were effectively dead in the water before the session had even begun. The 40-year-old did manage to overtake Nico Hulkenberg and Alex Albon, but this was only good enough to earn a P15 finish, way short of the top-eight result needed to score.

After climbing out of the cockpit, the seven-time world champion offered an apology to his team-mates and took responsibility for his tough start to the weekend. "But from my side, another mistake, so I've really got to look internally and apologise to the team, because it's unacceptable to be out in both Q1s," he told Sky Sports F1.

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"It's a very, very poor performance for myself. Anything can happen here. I mean, I don't know. I have no clue about tomorrow. It's going to be hard from where I am. Definitely a weekend to forget.

"It's incredibly painful [to be out in Q1]. It's turning out to be a pretty bad weekend so far. I was the same as I was for the rest of the weekend. We made some changes, the car didn't feel terrible, but it was tough for us because we had to put a second set of tyres on just to get through Q1, so not great.

"That's my mistake, so I'm just really sorry to the team for all the hard work. All the testing, you know, the filming day that we did, and all the preparation, and then you come here and you don't even make it through Q1, which is unacceptable. I'm really sorry."