LONDON – Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas beat his British teammate Lewis Hamilton to win the pole position in qualifying for the 70th Anniversary Grand Prix.

The Finnish racer will start from the top order of the grid in Sunday’s race at the Silverstone circuit in the United Kingdom.

It was Bottas’ second pole position of the season – after the one obtained in Austria – and the 13th of his career.

“It feels good. I just love qualifying, especially when it goes well,” he said in a statement after the race. “I just wanted to get the best out of myself and the car. It was a good set-up from last weekend, it felt better. It’s an amazing car, it’s so quick.”

“Of course, my main aim is to win the race and I’m starting from a good place. The pace is good,” he added. “I’ll try to get a good start off the line like I did last week and for the mentality, just try and win it.”

Bottas’ best time, achieved on the last attempt on medium tires, was 1:25.154, 0.063 seconds faster than Hamilton.

“It was not that great, but Valtteri did a good job,” Hamilton said afterward. “The car for me, it was not a perfect last lap.”

Third place went to the Racing Point driver Nico Hülkenberg, who had already set the second-fastest time in Q2 and was just under a second off the pace in the final session, ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who came in fourth.

Daniel Ricciardo with Red Bull was fifth, followed by Canada’s Lance Stroll for Racing Point, Pierre Gasly with AlphaTauri, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, Alexander Albon for Red Bull and McLaren’s Lando Norris who finished the top ten.

Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel for Ferrari and Carlos Sainz with McLaren were left out of the top 10 after finishing 12th and 13th, respectively.

The Spaniard had a best final lap of 1:27.083 and was out of Q3 for the first time this season along with the German driver, who was only five-thousandths of a second faster to finish.

Renault’s Esteban Ocon was also eliminated after coming in 11th, who along with Romain Grosjean for Haas and Williams’s George Russell completed the eliminations.