Lewis Hamilton Mercedes Brazilian GP PlanetF1
Lewis Hamilton at the rain-drenched 2024 Brazilian Grand Prix.
Damning his W15 as the “worst” it has ever been, Andrew Shovlin says Mercedes are “trying to understand” why Lewis Hamilton struggled with rear-end grip in Brazil.
Returning to a track where he has won three times, Hamilton had a wretched weekend at the Interlagos circuit as he walked away with a single point on a weekend in which 34 were up for grabs.
Lewis Hamilton struggled as George Russell fought for a podium
Hamilton was P11 in both Sprint qualifying and the Sprint as the Briton lacked pace in the dry, undone by bouncing on the newly-resurfaced track.
He likened it to Baku 2022, a race where he was seen clutching at his back as he climbed out of his Mercedes F1 car.
“For us down the straight it was hitting so hard, so we did lift the car,” he explained. “It was a little bit better in terms of it wasn’t hitting the deck so badly, so I wasn’t in pain or anything like that.”
Despite setup changes ahead of qualifying proper, which only took place on Sunday morning as a deluge hit the track and led to qualifying being postponed, Hamilton still struggled for pace.
It was even worse in qualifying as he was eliminated in Q1, down in 16th place, and decried “damn car” as he made his way back to the pits. As his team-mate George Russell romped to second place in the Sunday morning session, Hamilton was already speaking with the media.
“With the car I have right now, it’s the worst I’ve ever driven so I probably won’t be going very far with it,” he said.
The Briton did at least make his way into the points in the afternoon’s Grand Prix, racing his way to 10th place but even then he wasn’t happy with his Mercedes F1 car.
While Russell finished fourth having been in contention for a podium before a red flag stoppage, Hamilton was only P10.
“At least one car was behaving!,” he told the media after the Grand Prix.
“It’s like a plank of wood. There’s no suspension. It’s just bouncing on the tyres, everywhere. Can’t get on the power anywhere. The worst ride definitely that we’ve ever had, particularly through corners. Just so stiff.”
Shovlin, Mercedes’ trackside engineer director, says Mercedes are working with Hamilton’s side of the garage to understand the issue as it’s “not obvious” to the team where things went wrong.
“Normally you are able to do it,” he said on the Mercedes race debrief when asked how challenging it was to setup the car for both drivers. “You let the drivers deviate with the setup.
“They do not have to run the same, and we will let them evolve their own setup. And when one of them appears to be going well, you often take elements of that setup, or even the whole lot, and put it onto the other car.
“Now, it is fair to say Lewis was struggling predominantly with a lack of rear grip. If we look at how he had set up his car, it is not obvious where that was coming from.
“But in the Sprint race, as soon as you have got less grip and you are getting the snaps of oversteer on exit, you generate more temperature. That in itself will prolong the problem.
“As with any race, we spend a lot of time digging into the data, trying to understand it, and Lewis’ engineering crew will be working with him on this issue, trying to make sure we get to the bottom of it before Vegas.
“The other factor with the weekend was the conditions were very different. Sprint qualy, Sprint race, that was in the dry, it was very hot and then the main qualy and the Grand Prix were in the wet. We did not have the session-after-session flow to iterate the setup and understand how to get the most out of the car.
“That is not the reason for the issue, but was certainly something that made it more difficult for him to get the setup that he wanted on for the race.”
After Brazil Hamilton trails Russell by two points with three races remaining in the season.
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