Lewis Hamilton says his performance in qualifying for the sprint race in Montreal vindicated his decision not to use the simulator before the weekend began. He was quickest in the first round of qualifying and second in the second phase, but slipped to fifth on the grid in the shoot-out for pole position. Nonetheless Hamilton was pleased with his performance, which he feels was partly down to not preparing for the race on Ferrari’s simulator.“That was probably the best qualifying session we’ve had for some time,” said Hamilton. “Just really great work with the engineers, the set-up changes, the car felt really fantastic from [practice] and we made just subtle changes going into quali. “[SQ1 and SQ2 were] looking good and then I don’t know why the others are able to turn up a little bit more. But I’m just happy to be there in a fight. I was having so much fun out there. “Also the fact that I didn’t do the sim, and I feel it’s the best I’ve felt all year, so I think that’s the way forward for me.” Hamilton explained on Thursday he did not use a simulator regularly before joining Ferrari. “The sim is amazing,” he said. “It’s an amazing space to work in. It’s the best sim I’ve ever seen and best group of people that I’ve known, a large team of people that I get to work with there. So, a day at the sim is actually pretty incredible. It is a very powerful tool and something that as a team we continue to evolve. “Since I’ve been there, I’ve had a lot of input in some of this evolution and they’ve been really [responsive] and made loads and loads of changes and we’ve just been improving it. Advert | Become a