Lewis Hamilton is expecting another difficult weekend in Miami…
Having finished 30 seconds behind Charles Leclerc in Saudi Arabia, Lewis Hamilton is expecting more disappointments this weekend in Miami.
Aside from a strong Sprint event at the Chinese Grand Prix, Hamilton has struggled for confidence and pace since arriving at Ferrari and is expecting more of the same in Miami.
Lewis Hamilton: At the moment, there’s no fix
Hamilton finished in seventh place at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, coming home over a pitstop behind teammate Charles Leclerc as the Monegasque raced his way to the podium.
It’s the latest disappointment for the seven-time F1 World Champion, who qualified six-tenths of a second behind Leclerc and has been heard over team radio making enquiries about where he’s losing time to rivals – seemingly mystified by their pace relative to him.
His team switch has seen a continuation of Hamilton’s troubles in qualifying last year with Mercedes, and it’s led to him becoming very downbeat in recent weeks as the reality of his struggles has hit him.
Heading to Miami this weekend, Hamilton has predicted further strife awaits him on the circuit at the Hard Rock Stadium, having confirmed to Spain’s DAZN in Saudi Arabia that he would “cancel some plans” in order to put in a week’s work to better understand his Jeddah problems.
“I think I’ll struggle also in Miami,” Hamilton told media, including PlanetF1.com, in Saudi Arabia.
“I don’t know how much longer I’ll struggle for, but it’s definitely painful.
“At the moment there’s no fix. So, this is how it’s going to be for the rest of the year. It’s going to be painful.”
Hamilton’s main issue appears to be confidence in medium to high-speed corners, which was emphasised quite clearly at the high-speed Jeddah circuit, and Hamilton said it’s evident in the data where he’s falling short of what Leclerc is managing.
“He’s been driving this car for a long time, so he definitely knows it really well. There’s plenty in the data, for sure,” Hamilton explained.
“I mean, honestly, like, it doesn’t look massively different in the data. Just… I go slower through the corners. We do have slightly different setups, I have to look and see whether that setup is the way the car likes to be.
“Yeah, him and his side are definitely obviously doing a better job.”
Having felt as though he’d made a step forward during the latter half of the Bahrain Grand Prix, Hamilton said he was confused by his performance in Saudi Arabia – the seven-time F1 World Champion has been open in admitting that the issues are on his side and has gone as far as saying he needs a “brain transplant” to overcome his struggles.
“It was horrible. It was horrible. Not enjoyable at all. I was just sliding around,” he said of a race in which there was “nothing positive” to take anything away from.
“First stint, massive understeer, car not turning. And then massive deg. And then the second stint, slightly better balance, but still just no pace. Yeah, pretty bad.”
“I’m struggling to feel the car underneath me. But there’s no particular thing. There’s nothing to say ‘Hey, this is the issue’.
“In qualifying, it’s me extracting performance. In the race, I tried everything, and the car just didn’t want to go quicker.”
Fred Vasseur ‘2000 percent’ behind Lewis Hamilton
Hamilton also revealed that his Ferrari bosses “are not happy” with his performance level, saying that he himself isn’t satisfied with how he’s faring.
But Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur has called for calm as Hamilton sets about unlocking more performance after what has only been five races for the Scuderia.
“I will be 2,000 per cent behind him,” Vasseur said.
“I will give him support and we will start from tomorrow morning to try to find solutions and reasons and to work on it early in the morning.
“But honestly, I am not too worried. The potential is there for sure.
“We just have to adjust the balance because we are, collectively, Lewis and us, we are struggling with the balance of his car and [how] he is working the tyres.
“It’s a kind of negative spot but I think the potential of the car is there and we will try to solve that.”
Vassuer took issue with the suggestion by a journalist that Hamilton’s form has dropped off dramatically, snapping: “It’s not dramatically.
“We did five races so far. I know that you want to have the big headlines tomorrow that ‘Fred said this.’
“But this is f***ing bull***t. At the end of the day, we are in competition. You have ups and downs.
“When we have ups, we are not World Champions. When we have downs, we are not nowhere. It’s just a competition.
“I’m not sure that you draw the same conclusion with Max [Verstappen] last week when he was seventh [in Bahrain].
“It is like it is. The competition is tight.
“You have 10 cars and a couple of tenths. Have a look at Max. He won in Japan. He finished 30 seconds behind [Oscar] Piastri in Bahrain and in Saudi Arabia he was P2 and had pole position.
“We just have to stay calm. You can do whatever you want. I don’t want to worry for you. At least for us as a team, we have to work step by step.
“I think it paid off last year to do hundredths of seconds and hundredths of seconds and we need to keep the same approach.
“I will never be the guy who says we are World Champions or we are nowhere.
“We are a team. We are struggling on the weekend, we have good results on the weekend.
“It’s just that we have to improve step by step and stay calm.”
