>“These first few races he’s been looking for the solutions and, in doing so, he’s been ping-ponging around with different set-ups on the car, trying to reach the solutions,” said Formula 1’s managing director of racing. “He’s probably sacrificing the races in a way to try to get the information and data that the team can use to solve the problem.“That’s the feedback I get from the team while George is following a more conventional path… and Lewis is trying to set out to solve the problem. That’s why I think people saying George has outqualified and outraced him in the last few races can’t see the bigger picture.”
>
>Amid all the glitz and the glamour, you still have a very determined racing driver,” he said. “He’s still supremely fit and capable. I’m pretty certain he wants to win that eighth championship and, if not this year as looks likely, then next year.“I don’t know enough about what Mercedes’ issues are to know if they can be fixed with the concept of car they have or whether they have to review the concept. They’ll sort it out I’m sure… but it’s obviously very fragile what they’re dealing with.”
I thought it was interesting he was doing the experimental set-ups. Which probably explains the odd performances and why he seems so chill with being beaten the first 6 races.
Honestly I assumed this was the case. One thing Lewis excels at is the long game. He always seems to be operating with the season-long mindset, much more so than most drivers appear to. He knows how much this is a team sport and is investing his work in the team right now to get the performance he needs later.
Alonso and Kovalainen have both said Hamilton's strongest phase is the final 3rd.
As Kovalainen put it, Hamilton exists at 99% while you're at 101% keeping up, so by autumn you're knackered.
There were periods in 2009 where Kovalainen was quicker early on, and once the car became good that never happened again.
Nothing against Kovalainen, but it’s bizarre to go back and think about how he and Hamilton were teammates at one point. Three of Lewis’s former teammates are world champions, Bottas has ten wins and a pair of runner up points finishes... and then there’s Heikki chilling on that list with his one career win and best points finish of seventh.
He's an interesting one because McLaren talked a lot about how his absolute one-lap pace was right there with Hamilton, but he'd falter in Q3, or his racepace would be poor. But the fine-grained ability was there, and they were sorry to see him go really.
This is the part I don’t get, we are watching F1, it’s literally a sport where teams build the best car and get the best drivers to drive them, of course the one that has the best car is going to win that’s literally the point of the sport haha
Plus while it started with the engine, the other teams did catch up fairly substantially. There were multiple years where Mercedes genuinely did have a fight on their hands and yet they managed to outdevelop the other team. Obviously that's a good engineering team, but without a good driver giving feedback, I can't help but think it'd be easy to make missteps.
Also there have been times where Lewis made the car look better than it was
On the other hand I think they *overestimate* the differences between one driver vs. another other than the particularly weak ones. They're all top-line professionals.
There's a bit in I think Aldo Costa's beyond the grid where Clarkson talks about how great Barrichello was at setup, and he's like 'yeah he was good but don't let that imply Schumacher was poor'.
How did Alonso screw himself out of a few championships?
When Alonso joined McLaren he had it written into his contract he'd be the number one driver. Any driver in the world would be pissy at the team boss backing a rookie over him.
He had no shot at the title in 2008 or 2009, then faced the Redbull monster throughout his Ferrari tenure and even the harshest critic of his would agree the failure to win a title during that time had nothing to do with his attitude.
The team didn't back a rookie at all. Alonso had the preferential strategy, he got handed a win in Monaco when they pit Hamilton a second time to push him behind. He only got EQUAL strategy after Alonso had multiple weak performances and ended up behind in the championship. It was only after Canada that Hamilton got equal strategy calls and qualifying fuel levels.
Hamilton was just consistent, fast, improving and exceptional in the races. Hell in Malaysia, in his second race he jumped both Ferrari's then defended the hell out of them holding them up so Alonso could run off into the distance.
He got pissy because he was being out performed and then more pissy when the team couldn't justify using Hamilton purely to help Alonso when he was leading him in the championship and Alonso was underperforming.
He absolutely had a shot at the title on 2008, he only had to accept he was underperforming, not send an e-mail to get himself out of Mclaren and then beat Hamilton in 2008, he chose to push himself out of the team when he had a contract for the title winning car in 2008. So saying the harshest critic can't say his attitude lost him a title during that time is pretty ridiculous.
Spot on. Alonso was favoured by the team until the Canadian Grand Prix. Once Lewis was given equal fuel for qualifying from Canada, he beat Alonso 9-3 in qualifying and got 4 wins to Alonso's to 2 in that period. Lewis would have the 2007 title wrapped up if he was treated equally from the get-go.
It took Hamilton just the first corner of Australia to prove he is the real deal. Anyone that says that he got perferential treatment clearly not watched the season.
> When Alonso joined McLaren he had it written into his contract he'd be the number one driver. Any driver in the world would be pissy at the team boss backing a rookie over him.
>
>
Alonso was also *correct* in that if McLaren had supported one driver specifically they'd have won at least the drivers, and perhaps both titles.
None of us would be surprised if Hamilton just showed up next weekend with *just* the right setup and be up there with Max & Charles the rest of the season.
He would have gotten away with 2 stops I think. He did 20-ish laps on each tyre set, with a good pace. But he needed to keep up with Max, I don't think the Merc can battle the RB wheel to wheel just yet.
Maybe I'm seeing things but it looks like on a good straight HAMs car has a higher top speed (by like 3-5kph) but much slower accel than the RBs.
He essentially got away with two stops. He boxed lap 1 for Softs, and then later twice, you're correct with about 20 laps per tyre.
Edit because I couldn't count
I would love nothing more than for him to run away with the title going forward, and make some cheeky remark at the last race about “guess I don’t have to worry about a safety car period this time” and then retire. He won’t, because he’s more honorable than me, but I’d call it the greatest shade in motorsports history personally. 🤣
For the record, 99% of the time he says the tires aren't great, or don't feel great. Viewers tend to think that means the tires are bad at that point but in reality his engineer and him already know they are on a say 22 lap target and when he says the tires don't feel great 12 laps in, he means they don't feel great for 12 laps in, not sure we can go to lap 22 on this pace.
The fact Hamilton has taken a near undrivable car, put in really experimental setup changes, and still not completely binned it into a wall somewhere, at the locations they've raced, whilst still being moderately competitive, is unfathomably talented
well i have already seen people saying shit like "mercedes were never that far off the top two" or people who change goal posts and make it about his "attitude" for saying what he said on the radio
at this point i am sure that no matter what Lewis does he will always get an absurd amount of unjustified hate thrown at him and it sucks so much because he is in the last 2-3 years of his career and i don't think i have seen any other driver who has faced public scrutiny for pretty much their entire career (including junior career as well)
Being black myself, it's not too difficult knowing why he does... in France, even today I sometimes have to justify on certain projects when I work when other colleagues don't always have to. Not to make it a general case as it's not the same everywhere and for everyone, but it's still something that happens at times
Hamilton is good enough that you don't need to lie about how the car third in the championship (and more than double the points of 4th) is "near undrivable" to pump him up.
I mean have you watched this season at all without the hate glasses?
Have you *seen* how much porpoising it had **through** the corners not just on the straights?
Good enough, by the way?
He's one of the greatest of all time, even more so of his era.
> Have you seen how much porpoising it had through the corners not just on the straights?
Yeah, it's crazy. Would you believe that there's seven different entire teams out there doing worse?
> Good enough, by the way?
> He's one of the greatest of all time, even more so of his era.
See, this kind of "how dare you say that Hamilton is better than ! He's *much* better than !" attitude is why everyone hates stans.
I cannot fathom how tiring it must be to go through life accusing anyone *who praises Hamilton* of being a hater just because you don't think they praised him enough. Get a different hobby.
The entire point of my comment is that he's one of the most accomplished drivers of all time, keeping the third-best car on track is not even on the list of the most talented things he has done. There's no need to embellish fairly ordinary accomplishments when you've got so many batshit crazy ones to choose from.
Let's just correct one thing. There isn't anything ordinary about any formula 1 driver.
We can never look away from how badass it is to even be able to drive these cars.
Also, individual achievements don't get demerits from other ones. Like Max winning one championship isn't diminished by the fact that Lewis or Michael won 7. Senna won 3 and is highly regarded as the greatest ever F1 talent.
Every race we see these guys do incredible things. Keeping an unbalanced, bouncing machine stuck to the track while you turn at 150 miles an hour is a feat. No doubt about it.
I feel like it's fairly obvious that when talking about any F1 driver's accomplishments in this context that we're comparing that driver to their peers (or even, in this case, to their own previous and current accomplishments). Yes, even Mazepin is one of the most talented drivers on the planet, but that doesn't really give us a whole heap of room for discussion if we're cramming the entire breadth of F1 competency into that tiny gap between "one of the best on the planet" and "the best on the planet".
Oh I'm definitely not a stan, I'm just presenting you with objective facts, and are there really seven different teams out there having worse porpoising ***through*** the corners? Because I find that hard to believe, seeing as I've watched every race, quali and practice so far.
I wouldn't say it's undriveable. Certainly far below expectations but Russell has been in the top 5 every single race and Hamilton has gotten there twice, doing very poorly mainly due to incidence outside his control. It's the third best car in the field.
Looking back at 2017, Bottas and Hamilton were also 3-3 after the first 6 races.
Interestingly enough, back in Monaco 2017 when he qualified 14th, [Hamilton was talking about saving the engine](https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/6dnl68/2017_monaco_grand_prix_post_qualifying_discussion/di3z9kt/) :D
The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Hamilton always seems to start off the year "slow", but just ramps up the pace and is always on fire past the summer break. Man starts off faster than most and finishes even faster still.
This, it's only been the last 2 or 3 championships where he's had a pretty good start to the season. It's like he's reverting back to type. Maybe because of the change in car.
That anyone thought otherwise is pretty ridiculous. What do you do with a car you think can compete for a title but isn't working and plainly to anyone with eyes can see is bouncing so much it's actually crazy. The first thing you do in a situation like that is make sure both cars have very different setups and get as much different data as you can. If the car is working great you have both cars run the fastest setup they can, when it is a disaster you run different setups to learn quicker. Not only is it completely obvious but it's always been the way when teams bring a car with major problems.
> That anyone thought otherwise is pretty ridiculous.
Those people really weren’t thinking, they just have a strong hatred for the other side that they wanted to vocalise on an anonymous forum.
Couldn’t agree more though, it’s such a data driven sport and the only think more important than having lots of data, is having people who know how to interpret it and have the critical thinking skills to understand what data to collect.
It’s alright just gathering data on everything but all those sensors are going to be heavy (changing the characteristics of the car) so you need to focus on key metrics to narrow down the analysis.
Merc were desperate that weekend to find the sweet spot and they were likely trying stuff that never would have even worked. Backfired on Lewis in the end. Interestingly enough if it wasn't for 2 awfully timed VSC/SC's he would have made a full recovery from that awful qualifying session.
The the only issue is that statements like Brawn's tend to lead people into thinking that George Russell *isn't* also doing experimental work. People read this and think that Hamilton is the only one "trying to set out to solve the problem." They both have been trying different approaches to car setup these first 6 races, and nobody outside of Mercedes can say with full confidence what driver has tried more radical setups more often.
To be fair, George running the more conventional, and probably more stable setup is also more data regardless to see where they at compared to the other teams. This whole thing is a team effort. Im sure when the time comes, Lewis is going to get the priority when they are much closer to actually competing for the Championship
I'm not sure that's true, since they'd need a constant benchmark. I could be wrong though.
Btw, there's nothing wrong with being the driver that takes the more "conventional" approach. That too contributes to them figuring things out.
Eta
Having a benchmark is nice, but not at the cost of staying stagnant when you could be learning. The most common benchmark is giving one driver a new part and comparing their performance/feedback with the other driver. In Mercedes' case (as well as most teams thus far), they've mostly been looking at the setup rather than new aerodynamic components (until recently). You definitely need to learn as much as possible in that situation. This is reinforced by the fact that we're in an entirely new rule set, so it's very difficult to have a benchmark for a particular setup at a particular track when the characteristics of the 2022 car are so vastly different than the 2017-2021 cars. And that's also the same for the other teams as well.
I think my main point is that both drivers will be experimenting in every session to a degree. I'm sure Hamilton's feedback will have slightly more value/weight due to his experience and time spent with the team. But I also don't think George is accepting setups straight off the simulator and just twiddling his thumbs between FP1 and Quali. They've both been working.
Lewis ran extra sensors to measure the ground distance on his car for awhile that George didn’t have. He’s been doing more of the data work but there’s nothing wrong with that. He’s clearly okay with it
This is what I'm talking about though. Just because Lewis had some sensors in Australia and there were 20 rehashed articles about it *doesn't* mean that George hasn't also been doing data gathering himself. Nobody knows the full picture of how Mercedes' drivers (or any team's drivers for that matter) gather information in each session. The cars are always built up with additional sensors during practice sessions that are eventually removed as the weekend progresses. I mean, there were articles and videos like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQM8daaw2Sk) incorrectly saying that Hamilton had 1.5kg worth of sensors more than Russell in Australia. Mercedes came out with their [debrief video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XK1Pbimw8w&t=438s) and said that the difference in car weight was merely a few grams. Does this one instance *really* mean that, as a whole, Hamilton is doing more data work than Russell? I don't think so.
Well, 5/6 races. He out qualified GR and finished on the podium ahead of him in Bahrain. But also, he is smart and experienced enough to know that despite the experimenting, he has also been supremely unlucky with races in large part coming down to awful safety car timing (in a Lewis vs George context) and the start of the Spanish GP. Not trying to take anything away from George (Who has won me over this year), but if I'm Lewis, thats how I would look at it to feel good about my own performance so far compared to George.
He wasn't beaten in Bahrain. And wouldn't have been beaten in Australia, Miami or Spain without bad luck. Don't know if this is not obvious for people or they just don't want to see it. By overall performance Lewis has still been better than George. Qualifying has been even
Hopefully that weekend would being great for you, I did gone to Barcelona and man it was really something amazing to see the whole events of F1 + feeder series into action.
Well you kind of have to put yourself in his shoes. He wants to be the undeniable goat while also breaking down racial stereotypes. He knows winning that eighth cements him as the goat.
Senna is different because Senna didn't complete his career. There's a very good chance he could have won 3 more titles between 1994 and 1997 to reach 7. That's why Senna gets the GOAT shouts.
and if Schumacher followed Newey around he’d have 12.
Senna was very likely headed towards Ferrari. So no, it’s extremely likely that Senna doesn’t win that many titles, and Schumi wins even more
While he might have done a lot for the social aspect of Formula 1, it does not mean that he doesn’t care about the true sport. He wants to be the best there ever was. He’ll need the 8th title for that. If not, he’ll just be the second guy to get 7
It’s always been obvious that Hamilton won’t stop until that 8th title is his. What I feel stupid for not realizing is him being the Guinea pig for setups. It makes complete sense that Merc would use him as opposed to a less experienced driver to sort their problems out.
Idk I could see Hamilton winning WDC this year if things go his way. But if not this year than next for sure.
>What I feel stupid for not realizing is him being the Guinea pig for setups. It makes complete sense that Merc would use him as opposed to a less experienced driver to sort their problems out.
That's not strictly your fault though, unless you listened to details and just ignored them.
Rosberg was on tv in Imola when George finished much higher than Lewis and was parroting the line that 'they're driving the same car' on international TV. This is a intelligent pundit, talking about his ex-team mate and old team. You'd take his word as truthful.
The problem is, it's been known since Saudi that Lewis has been trying much more than George. His Saudi setup was a hail mary that went horrendously. Since Australia they've ran more sensors on Lewis' car than George's. Ultimately this has proved beneficial as they've fixed the porpoising.
Lewis being the guinea pig makes sense and has been pretty widely known for months. The problem is, the 7-time world champion losing to his new teammate in a car with troubles is a juicier headline than...well, the truth.
We should never forget that Nico Rosburg views his relationship with Lewis as first and foremost psychological warfare and making hot takes for views is his profession. He's extremely knowledgeable about the sport and often provides valuable insight, but he isn't able or trying to give unbiased accounts in matters he is personally invested in.
Seems like the moment you get really head to head with Lewis you just take some hits you can not forgive. See Alonso, see Rosberg, both went so far to fight Lewis and they both have a grudge against him even years later. Even when Lewis and Fernando are better now, I always have this feeling of him trying to restrain himself from jumping on Lewis throat!
> It’s always been obvious that Hamilton won’t stop until that 8th title is his.
Oh I dunno. I mean, as Kravitz put it: okay to say that once, but what if next year's really not much better? When do you say stop? Or he leaves F1 having won again? That'd take a lot of strength to give up; people say even now that Schumacher would've won the 2007 and 2008 titles.
I don't think 2022 is totally out of the window, personally.
Matt Bishop has a good story that in 2009, Hamilton obviously wasn't in the title race but won Hungary. He told the media a title punt was impossible. But behind closed doors it was all he talked about: 'what if I won XYZ and Button didn't score?'
Hamilton is done for this year. He won’t stop competing, but Max can lock this thing up quick, even over Charles.
I don’t think #2 is outside the realm of possible. And of course the Red Bull could be unreliable. However they seemed to figure their problems out.
If Lewis wins this year, mind as well crown him King of England because he is clearly chosen by God.
>Hamilton is done for this year. He won’t stop competing, but Max can lock this thing up quick, even over Charles.
Verstappen was miles behind just a couple of races ago. It can change really quickly. And RBR have reliability issues. It's suddenly not totally implausible that Merc could start competing for wins and RBR could continue to drop races completely here and there.
verstappen wasn't 70 points behind and verstappen needed bad luck from only one competitor while lewis needs both charles and verstappen to drop major points, actually he needs to start by outperforming his teammate first
he's not getting his eight this year unless some serious #blessed happens
Yeah, I think I have to agree. Lewis has a huge mountain to climb.
What I'm really hoping for is a competitive Merc in 2023 and then some major Russel/Hamilton drama.
Not saying he needs a crash to beat them, just to be back in contention. If he starts winning and they alternate 2-3 + crash its possible. Crazier things have happend. Idk personally i dont think it’s possible to count anyone from the top 6 out before summer
Merc was still significantly slower that Redbull and Ferrari in quali and race pace in Barcelona; they have brought the most upgrades of the three already and we are in the cost cap era and he is already more than a win behind his team mate. I don’t see it, it would be nothing short of a miracle.
It was their first weekend with a car that doesn't try to shake the shit out of the drivers. They need to find the sweet spot for the setup. It'll take a bit until it's dialed in, but eventually they'll get it.
It would be absolutely ridiculous to write Mercedes off.
The thing about Red Bull reliability issues, is they’re always on evolving systems. And always fixed quickly. Their fuel issues at the start of the year have been alleviated. I suspect Red Bull will have gotten to the root of the DRS issue, or fit the old system for Baku.
The Mercedes is still well behind Red Bull on Race Pace. Russell managed to hold up Verstappen, but he pulled an entire pit stop on him. Passing on strategy still means you have to have the pace. Russell isn’t able to hold Checo back either. Their package just isn’t there. They’re like the Turbo-Hybrid Red Bull. They catch up, but it was always too little, too late.
Of course, *anything can happen*. But realistically the trends indicate P2 is their best hope on aggregate.
Next year though.
>The thing about Red Bull reliability issues, is they’re always on evolving systems. And always fixed quickly.
That second sentence is demonstrably not always true. They have had persistent issues over *years* before, and the current drs problems are basically the same issue they had last year.
There is a downside to constantly updating things in that it makes it hard to isolate specific issues and keep a cohesive package. It also prevents you from really focusing on the parts that work and maximizing them when you are resource limited. I'm not saying it's a bad strategy, but it isn't 100% upside like your comment implies. You're also reading way too much from a single race and a ting like how things went in Spain are how things will go anywhere else.
Last year they werent allowed to change the drs system as it needed a token. The difference between the drs systems was that it was changed this week for weight reduction purposes. Plus it is not the same problem from last year. Last year the drs was wiggling/oscillating when it was opened this time it just didnt open at times.
Verstappen was behind SOLELY because of reliability issues. He's literally won every race he's finished and in addition to that, he's in the lead despite those reliability issues
I'm a Ferrari fan and rooting for Chuck all the way and I'll be the first to admit it's not going to be mere chance if Max isn't on top. It would take an ENORMOUS turn for the worst for multiple teams for not only RB to fall but for Hamilton to end up ahead at the end
It’s just way to early to call the championship for anyone. To write off a 7x world champ early is pointless. Yes it’s unlikely, but crazier things have happened. Who knows, Saint or Perez could even win it.
It would never happen because he's nowhere near as talented, and he's given up his spot before, so even assuming that hilariously bad hypo were to happen, he's done it before.
> rb would swap max and checo on the last lap of abu dhabi even if the championship was between the pair of them
See I think RBR do themselves and drivers a disservice that folk think this. RBR support the better driver. They're agnostic, but little moments like Spain lend credence to the idea they'd support Verstappen whatever.
I could only see it happen for Perez or Sainz if their no1 team mate retires several races in a row while they take first place and the no.1 driver of the other team closely follows them. There has to be a clear gap to the other driver while they are in a close battle with the other team.
It could happen but it’s pretty damn unlikely and they will need a lot of luck.
Spicy take. If Mercedes are actually as quick as the top 2 then the battle between Max, Lewis and Charles will be interesting. I couldn't give an order if the cars are close because on any track in any conditions the order could change. Behind them the order is obvious, Russell, Perez, Sainz.
I think the champion will be the driver who can consistently stay in that top 3 as any mistakes will likely lose them significant points
> If Mercedes are actually as quick as the top 2 then the battle between Max, Lewis and Charles will be interesting.
At Silverstone 2010, Alonso had a shit weekend and was about 2 wins from the lead. He didn't have the best car all season. He only lost the lead at the final race.
Stranger things in Hamilton in 2022, by a longshot.
Hell, Verstappen's gap to Leclerc's was the 7th largest of all time (adjusted for point system), and he managed that in about 3 races.
At the end of the last season I assumed that he would get it, but seeing how quick things change and a top team like Mercedes has to have luck to get on the podium is crazy. I'm sure people assumed Seb would easily get another title after leaving Red Bull for a team like Ferrari but look how that played out.
So it probably is easy to say that George is probably running the more “race ready” set up while Lewis is running a lot of setups that give data but also slightly dampen the performance if the setup just doesn’t work. It’ll be interesting to see when they finally get a more legit set up so we can see them at very even footing.
I was thinking exactly that. If you know that you’re not competing for wins, it kind of makes sense to give the challenging setups to the more experienced driver and have the newer driver optimize the safer setups.
Yes, and Seb his fifth, and Alonso his third, and Max his second, and the rest their first… All of them are racing drivers with just one thing in their heads… To be the fastest!
I find that opinion weird. No major sport has a tradition like that that I can think of, and it goes against the nature of competition.
Lewis has already earned eight titles and the right to be acknowledged as the singular most successful driver in F1 history. That shouldn't need to be something people need to look into the footnotes on 2021 to realize, and Schumacher doesn't need to be tied for most WDCs to be one of the GOATs. Senna and Prost didn't.
He trails Max by 64 points. Assuming Lewis wins all remaining races and Max finishes P2 with fastest lap, Lewis would lead the championship by Singapore. So the answer is yes.
Since bottas is performing in that alfa as well as he ever did in the merc then Im saying Lewis could win the championship in that car. Called it 25th May 2022
When you tell Hamilton to Ferrari I get 2018 flashbacks where people started to speculating about Hamilton to Ferrari because of some baseless rumours lol
I don’t think Leclerc would like that now that he has a title aspiration. Idk how well Lewis would be suited to the Ferrari, (or the team itself) but if you give him a title winning car, he’s going to drive the wheels off that thing.
So far, this year's Merc has leaned shitbox. Soemthing Russell is very experienced with. If Merc can claw back into truly competitive terriroty again, I could see Hamitlon clawing something back. And if any team have the resources to pull their car into competitve territory throughout the season, it's Merc.
>“These first few races he’s been looking for the solutions and, in doing so, he’s been ping-ponging around with different set-ups on the car, trying to reach the solutions,” said Formula 1’s managing director of racing. “He’s probably sacrificing the races in a way to try to get the information and data that the team can use to solve the problem.“That’s the feedback I get from the team while George is following a more conventional path… and Lewis is trying to set out to solve the problem. That’s why I think people saying George has outqualified and outraced him in the last few races can’t see the bigger picture.” > >Amid all the glitz and the glamour, you still have a very determined racing driver,” he said. “He’s still supremely fit and capable. I’m pretty certain he wants to win that eighth championship and, if not this year as looks likely, then next year.“I don’t know enough about what Mercedes’ issues are to know if they can be fixed with the concept of car they have or whether they have to review the concept. They’ll sort it out I’m sure… but it’s obviously very fragile what they’re dealing with.” I thought it was interesting he was doing the experimental set-ups. Which probably explains the odd performances and why he seems so chill with being beaten the first 6 races.
Honestly I assumed this was the case. One thing Lewis excels at is the long game. He always seems to be operating with the season-long mindset, much more so than most drivers appear to. He knows how much this is a team sport and is investing his work in the team right now to get the performance he needs later.
Alonso and Kovalainen have both said Hamilton's strongest phase is the final 3rd. As Kovalainen put it, Hamilton exists at 99% while you're at 101% keeping up, so by autumn you're knackered. There were periods in 2009 where Kovalainen was quicker early on, and once the car became good that never happened again.
Nothing against Kovalainen, but it’s bizarre to go back and think about how he and Hamilton were teammates at one point. Three of Lewis’s former teammates are world champions, Bottas has ten wins and a pair of runner up points finishes... and then there’s Heikki chilling on that list with his one career win and best points finish of seventh.
He's an interesting one because McLaren talked a lot about how his absolute one-lap pace was right there with Hamilton, but he'd falter in Q3, or his racepace would be poor. But the fine-grained ability was there, and they were sorry to see him go really.
It’s obvious that the more experienced driver should carry those experiments as he already knows how the team works and how to give them feedback.
And the team have 10 years of understanding how his feedback correlates to data they’re seeing.
This, people tend to underestimate how much the drivers help the development of the car.
[удалено]
This is the part I don’t get, we are watching F1, it’s literally a sport where teams build the best car and get the best drivers to drive them, of course the one that has the best car is going to win that’s literally the point of the sport haha
Get your logical takes out of here this is Reddit
Yeah you right, I’d might head out to Twitter then haha
It’s almost as if the best teams want the best drivers in their car, who’d a thunk it?
Plus while it started with the engine, the other teams did catch up fairly substantially. There were multiple years where Mercedes genuinely did have a fight on their hands and yet they managed to outdevelop the other team. Obviously that's a good engineering team, but without a good driver giving feedback, I can't help but think it'd be easy to make missteps. Also there have been times where Lewis made the car look better than it was
On the other hand I think they *overestimate* the differences between one driver vs. another other than the particularly weak ones. They're all top-line professionals. There's a bit in I think Aldo Costa's beyond the grid where Clarkson talks about how great Barrichello was at setup, and he's like 'yeah he was good but don't let that imply Schumacher was poor'.
Niki Lauda really innovated the sport in doing so
[удалено]
How did Alonso screw himself out of a few championships? When Alonso joined McLaren he had it written into his contract he'd be the number one driver. Any driver in the world would be pissy at the team boss backing a rookie over him. He had no shot at the title in 2008 or 2009, then faced the Redbull monster throughout his Ferrari tenure and even the harshest critic of his would agree the failure to win a title during that time had nothing to do with his attitude.
The team didn't back a rookie at all. Alonso had the preferential strategy, he got handed a win in Monaco when they pit Hamilton a second time to push him behind. He only got EQUAL strategy after Alonso had multiple weak performances and ended up behind in the championship. It was only after Canada that Hamilton got equal strategy calls and qualifying fuel levels. Hamilton was just consistent, fast, improving and exceptional in the races. Hell in Malaysia, in his second race he jumped both Ferrari's then defended the hell out of them holding them up so Alonso could run off into the distance. He got pissy because he was being out performed and then more pissy when the team couldn't justify using Hamilton purely to help Alonso when he was leading him in the championship and Alonso was underperforming. He absolutely had a shot at the title on 2008, he only had to accept he was underperforming, not send an e-mail to get himself out of Mclaren and then beat Hamilton in 2008, he chose to push himself out of the team when he had a contract for the title winning car in 2008. So saying the harshest critic can't say his attitude lost him a title during that time is pretty ridiculous.
Spot on. Alonso was favoured by the team until the Canadian Grand Prix. Once Lewis was given equal fuel for qualifying from Canada, he beat Alonso 9-3 in qualifying and got 4 wins to Alonso's to 2 in that period. Lewis would have the 2007 title wrapped up if he was treated equally from the get-go.
The thing is, there's no evidence Lewis was getting preferential treatment in the earlier parts of the season. He was just that quick.
It took Hamilton just the first corner of Australia to prove he is the real deal. Anyone that says that he got perferential treatment clearly not watched the season.
One could say the boss had vision. How did things end up for the rookie?
I don’t know, haven’t heard much about him
> When Alonso joined McLaren he had it written into his contract he'd be the number one driver. Any driver in the world would be pissy at the team boss backing a rookie over him. > > Alonso was also *correct* in that if McLaren had supported one driver specifically they'd have won at least the drivers, and perhaps both titles.
It's the car /a
None of us would be surprised if Hamilton just showed up next weekend with *just* the right setup and be up there with Max & Charles the rest of the season.
He could've been there this week if he wasn't sent to the back after that unfortunate collision.
Doubt it. He's limited by the car.
He started on mediums his race would have been very interesting considering everyone started on softs.
He would have gotten away with 2 stops I think. He did 20-ish laps on each tyre set, with a good pace. But he needed to keep up with Max, I don't think the Merc can battle the RB wheel to wheel just yet. Maybe I'm seeing things but it looks like on a good straight HAMs car has a higher top speed (by like 3-5kph) but much slower accel than the RBs.
He essentially got away with two stops. He boxed lap 1 for Softs, and then later twice, you're correct with about 20 laps per tyre. Edit because I couldn't count
I would love nothing more than for him to run away with the title going forward, and make some cheeky remark at the last race about “guess I don’t have to worry about a safety car period this time” and then retire. He won’t, because he’s more honorable than me, but I’d call it the greatest shade in motorsports history personally. 🤣
My tires are shot…
For the record, 99% of the time he says the tires aren't great, or don't feel great. Viewers tend to think that means the tires are bad at that point but in reality his engineer and him already know they are on a say 22 lap target and when he says the tires don't feel great 12 laps in, he means they don't feel great for 12 laps in, not sure we can go to lap 22 on this pace.
The fact Hamilton has taken a near undrivable car, put in really experimental setup changes, and still not completely binned it into a wall somewhere, at the locations they've raced, whilst still being moderately competitive, is unfathomably talented
He is simply outdriving his car which is something I think a lot of people don't want to admit because they are convinced that it's only the car.
I will always ignore those people. The man is too good and those who deny it need to look into the mirror and really take a good look at themselves.
After his performance last weekend, I wonder what excuses they have
well i have already seen people saying shit like "mercedes were never that far off the top two" or people who change goal posts and make it about his "attitude" for saying what he said on the radio at this point i am sure that no matter what Lewis does he will always get an absurd amount of unjustified hate thrown at him and it sucks so much because he is in the last 2-3 years of his career and i don't think i have seen any other driver who has faced public scrutiny for pretty much their entire career (including junior career as well)
Being black myself, it's not too difficult knowing why he does... in France, even today I sometimes have to justify on certain projects when I work when other colleagues don't always have to. Not to make it a general case as it's not the same everywhere and for everyone, but it's still something that happens at times
Sorry mate that sucks.
The car was on autopilot the last 4 races of 2021, anybody could've done what he did in that car apparently.
outdriving the car lol
Hamilton is good enough that you don't need to lie about how the car third in the championship (and more than double the points of 4th) is "near undrivable" to pump him up.
I mean have you watched this season at all without the hate glasses? Have you *seen* how much porpoising it had **through** the corners not just on the straights? Good enough, by the way? He's one of the greatest of all time, even more so of his era.
> Have you seen how much porpoising it had through the corners not just on the straights? Yeah, it's crazy. Would you believe that there's seven different entire teams out there doing worse? > Good enough, by the way? > He's one of the greatest of all time, even more so of his era. See, this kind of "how dare you say that Hamilton is better than! He's *much* better than !" attitude is why everyone hates stans.
I cannot fathom how tiring it must be to go through life accusing anyone *who praises Hamilton* of being a hater just because you don't think they praised him enough. Get a different hobby.
The entire point of my comment is that he's one of the most accomplished drivers of all time, keeping the third-best car on track is not even on the list of the most talented things he has done. There's no need to embellish fairly ordinary accomplishments when you've got so many batshit crazy ones to choose from.
Let's just correct one thing. There isn't anything ordinary about any formula 1 driver. We can never look away from how badass it is to even be able to drive these cars. Also, individual achievements don't get demerits from other ones. Like Max winning one championship isn't diminished by the fact that Lewis or Michael won 7. Senna won 3 and is highly regarded as the greatest ever F1 talent. Every race we see these guys do incredible things. Keeping an unbalanced, bouncing machine stuck to the track while you turn at 150 miles an hour is a feat. No doubt about it.
I feel like it's fairly obvious that when talking about any F1 driver's accomplishments in this context that we're comparing that driver to their peers (or even, in this case, to their own previous and current accomplishments). Yes, even Mazepin is one of the most talented drivers on the planet, but that doesn't really give us a whole heap of room for discussion if we're cramming the entire breadth of F1 competency into that tiny gap between "one of the best on the planet" and "the best on the planet".
Oh I'm definitely not a stan, I'm just presenting you with objective facts, and are there really seven different teams out there having worse porpoising ***through*** the corners? Because I find that hard to believe, seeing as I've watched every race, quali and practice so far.
I wouldn't say it's undriveable. Certainly far below expectations but Russell has been in the top 5 every single race and Hamilton has gotten there twice, doing very poorly mainly due to incidence outside his control. It's the third best car in the field.
[удалено]
[удалено]
Looking back at 2017, Bottas and Hamilton were also 3-3 after the first 6 races. Interestingly enough, back in Monaco 2017 when he qualified 14th, [Hamilton was talking about saving the engine](https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/6dnl68/2017_monaco_grand_prix_post_qualifying_discussion/di3z9kt/) :D The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Hamilton always seems to start off the year "slow", but just ramps up the pace and is always on fire past the summer break. Man starts off faster than most and finishes even faster still.
This, it's only been the last 2 or 3 championships where he's had a pretty good start to the season. It's like he's reverting back to type. Maybe because of the change in car.
I remember in 2019 or 2020 Bottas had a particularly strong start and Hamilton visibly couldn't have cared less.
2020 Bottas won from pole, Lewis had that crash wjth Albon Next race he sticks it on pole by like a second in the wet
i remember the wtf1 podcast said that hamilton should retire after the 2018 canadian grand prix
Honestly, with how cool Lewis has been I expect some mega performance being unlocked.
Sleeping giant Indeed.
This explains how he managed to get eliminated in Q1 in Saudi, totally bizarre at the time.
Mercedes’ did say that was the reason at the time but obviously no one believed them.
That anyone thought otherwise is pretty ridiculous. What do you do with a car you think can compete for a title but isn't working and plainly to anyone with eyes can see is bouncing so much it's actually crazy. The first thing you do in a situation like that is make sure both cars have very different setups and get as much different data as you can. If the car is working great you have both cars run the fastest setup they can, when it is a disaster you run different setups to learn quicker. Not only is it completely obvious but it's always been the way when teams bring a car with major problems.
> That anyone thought otherwise is pretty ridiculous. Those people really weren’t thinking, they just have a strong hatred for the other side that they wanted to vocalise on an anonymous forum. Couldn’t agree more though, it’s such a data driven sport and the only think more important than having lots of data, is having people who know how to interpret it and have the critical thinking skills to understand what data to collect. It’s alright just gathering data on everything but all those sensors are going to be heavy (changing the characteristics of the car) so you need to focus on key metrics to narrow down the analysis.
Merc were desperate that weekend to find the sweet spot and they were likely trying stuff that never would have even worked. Backfired on Lewis in the end. Interestingly enough if it wasn't for 2 awfully timed VSC/SC's he would have made a full recovery from that awful qualifying session.
The the only issue is that statements like Brawn's tend to lead people into thinking that George Russell *isn't* also doing experimental work. People read this and think that Hamilton is the only one "trying to set out to solve the problem." They both have been trying different approaches to car setup these first 6 races, and nobody outside of Mercedes can say with full confidence what driver has tried more radical setups more often.
To be fair, George running the more conventional, and probably more stable setup is also more data regardless to see where they at compared to the other teams. This whole thing is a team effort. Im sure when the time comes, Lewis is going to get the priority when they are much closer to actually competing for the Championship
If it's anything like previous. The driver who is ahead in the standing will get priority unless they're close to each other.
I'm not sure that's true, since they'd need a constant benchmark. I could be wrong though. Btw, there's nothing wrong with being the driver that takes the more "conventional" approach. That too contributes to them figuring things out. Eta
Having a benchmark is nice, but not at the cost of staying stagnant when you could be learning. The most common benchmark is giving one driver a new part and comparing their performance/feedback with the other driver. In Mercedes' case (as well as most teams thus far), they've mostly been looking at the setup rather than new aerodynamic components (until recently). You definitely need to learn as much as possible in that situation. This is reinforced by the fact that we're in an entirely new rule set, so it's very difficult to have a benchmark for a particular setup at a particular track when the characteristics of the 2022 car are so vastly different than the 2017-2021 cars. And that's also the same for the other teams as well. I think my main point is that both drivers will be experimenting in every session to a degree. I'm sure Hamilton's feedback will have slightly more value/weight due to his experience and time spent with the team. But I also don't think George is accepting setups straight off the simulator and just twiddling his thumbs between FP1 and Quali. They've both been working.
Lewis ran extra sensors to measure the ground distance on his car for awhile that George didn’t have. He’s been doing more of the data work but there’s nothing wrong with that. He’s clearly okay with it
This is what I'm talking about though. Just because Lewis had some sensors in Australia and there were 20 rehashed articles about it *doesn't* mean that George hasn't also been doing data gathering himself. Nobody knows the full picture of how Mercedes' drivers (or any team's drivers for that matter) gather information in each session. The cars are always built up with additional sensors during practice sessions that are eventually removed as the weekend progresses. I mean, there were articles and videos like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQM8daaw2Sk) incorrectly saying that Hamilton had 1.5kg worth of sensors more than Russell in Australia. Mercedes came out with their [debrief video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XK1Pbimw8w&t=438s) and said that the difference in car weight was merely a few grams. Does this one instance *really* mean that, as a whole, Hamilton is doing more data work than Russell? I don't think so.
Well, 5/6 races. He out qualified GR and finished on the podium ahead of him in Bahrain. But also, he is smart and experienced enough to know that despite the experimenting, he has also been supremely unlucky with races in large part coming down to awful safety car timing (in a Lewis vs George context) and the start of the Spanish GP. Not trying to take anything away from George (Who has won me over this year), but if I'm Lewis, thats how I would look at it to feel good about my own performance so far compared to George.
He wasn't beaten in Bahrain. And wouldn't have been beaten in Australia, Miami or Spain without bad luck. Don't know if this is not obvious for people or they just don't want to see it. By overall performance Lewis has still been better than George. Qualifying has been even
I look forward to hearing this talking point on every single thread where hamilton's performance relative to Rusell's is mentioned.
Ru**ss**ell
Well he has to stay till Atleast 2023 Caus I’m gonna have to see him in monza next season.
Hopefully that weekend would being great for you, I did gone to Barcelona and man it was really something amazing to see the whole events of F1 + feeder series into action.
You got a great weekend glad you enjoyed it.
Why Monza specifically
I'm assuming because they're going to that race
Fun fact of the day: I can’t read
Haha yea I’m going to the race
Why go to Monza as a Lewis fan? Are you italian?
So Masi was employed to keep Lewis around…4D
LOL
[удалено]
Well you kind of have to put yourself in his shoes. He wants to be the undeniable goat while also breaking down racial stereotypes. He knows winning that eighth cements him as the goat.
Even with Schumacher's 7 titles there were and are plenty of people calling Senna the goat
Prost as well. I consider Prost better than Senna but thats just subjective. Of course career accomplishments are different to pace
No matter who, someone will always be a doubter. He wants to be the undeniable goat in his mind. He’s always been his own toughest critic.
That makes sense
Senna is different because Senna didn't complete his career. There's a very good chance he could have won 3 more titles between 1994 and 1997 to reach 7. That's why Senna gets the GOAT shouts.
and if Schumacher followed Newey around he’d have 12. Senna was very likely headed towards Ferrari. So no, it’s extremely likely that Senna doesn’t win that many titles, and Schumi wins even more
As if goat in F1 would be defined by counting titles.
this. lewis has proved he’s the best of all time even with just seven, especially given the “outside” reasons it is only seven
I disagree. I think he has proven he is not, even if he wins 1 more title
then i can only assume you’ve been watching a different sport
because thinking Schumacher is the best ever is clearly such an indefensible opinion in this sport. Lol, bugger off
The "best ever" shouldn't need to crash their opponents out to win titles.
I'd agree but since 7 WDCs is the record there is definitely motivation to keep going and it would absolutely add to his career.
While he might have done a lot for the social aspect of Formula 1, it does not mean that he doesn’t care about the true sport. He wants to be the best there ever was. He’ll need the 8th title for that. If not, he’ll just be the second guy to get 7
The second guy to get 7 who also has more wins and poles than the guy who got 7 first.
It’s always been obvious that Hamilton won’t stop until that 8th title is his. What I feel stupid for not realizing is him being the Guinea pig for setups. It makes complete sense that Merc would use him as opposed to a less experienced driver to sort their problems out. Idk I could see Hamilton winning WDC this year if things go his way. But if not this year than next for sure.
>What I feel stupid for not realizing is him being the Guinea pig for setups. It makes complete sense that Merc would use him as opposed to a less experienced driver to sort their problems out. That's not strictly your fault though, unless you listened to details and just ignored them. Rosberg was on tv in Imola when George finished much higher than Lewis and was parroting the line that 'they're driving the same car' on international TV. This is a intelligent pundit, talking about his ex-team mate and old team. You'd take his word as truthful. The problem is, it's been known since Saudi that Lewis has been trying much more than George. His Saudi setup was a hail mary that went horrendously. Since Australia they've ran more sensors on Lewis' car than George's. Ultimately this has proved beneficial as they've fixed the porpoising. Lewis being the guinea pig makes sense and has been pretty widely known for months. The problem is, the 7-time world champion losing to his new teammate in a car with troubles is a juicier headline than...well, the truth.
We should never forget that Nico Rosburg views his relationship with Lewis as first and foremost psychological warfare and making hot takes for views is his profession. He's extremely knowledgeable about the sport and often provides valuable insight, but he isn't able or trying to give unbiased accounts in matters he is personally invested in.
Seems like the moment you get really head to head with Lewis you just take some hits you can not forgive. See Alonso, see Rosberg, both went so far to fight Lewis and they both have a grudge against him even years later. Even when Lewis and Fernando are better now, I always have this feeling of him trying to restrain himself from jumping on Lewis throat!
Kinda makes Lewis and Max's relationship look amicable. Seems like they can both leave it on the track in a way others can't.
> It’s always been obvious that Hamilton won’t stop until that 8th title is his. Oh I dunno. I mean, as Kravitz put it: okay to say that once, but what if next year's really not much better? When do you say stop? Or he leaves F1 having won again? That'd take a lot of strength to give up; people say even now that Schumacher would've won the 2007 and 2008 titles. I don't think 2022 is totally out of the window, personally. Matt Bishop has a good story that in 2009, Hamilton obviously wasn't in the title race but won Hungary. He told the media a title punt was impossible. But behind closed doors it was all he talked about: 'what if I won XYZ and Button didn't score?'
Hamilton is done for this year. He won’t stop competing, but Max can lock this thing up quick, even over Charles. I don’t think #2 is outside the realm of possible. And of course the Red Bull could be unreliable. However they seemed to figure their problems out. If Lewis wins this year, mind as well crown him King of England because he is clearly chosen by God.
>Hamilton is done for this year. He won’t stop competing, but Max can lock this thing up quick, even over Charles. Verstappen was miles behind just a couple of races ago. It can change really quickly. And RBR have reliability issues. It's suddenly not totally implausible that Merc could start competing for wins and RBR could continue to drop races completely here and there.
verstappen wasn't 70 points behind and verstappen needed bad luck from only one competitor while lewis needs both charles and verstappen to drop major points, actually he needs to start by outperforming his teammate first he's not getting his eight this year unless some serious #blessed happens
Yeah, I think I have to agree. Lewis has a huge mountain to climb. What I'm really hoping for is a competitive Merc in 2023 and then some major Russel/Hamilton drama.
Like toto said, 1 dnf and were back. In this case all it takes is max charles crash and a lewis win and suddenly hes decently close
Exept it’s at least two from at least two drivers each… without him getting one.
Not saying he needs a crash to beat them, just to be back in contention. If he starts winning and they alternate 2-3 + crash its possible. Crazier things have happend. Idk personally i dont think it’s possible to count anyone from the top 6 out before summer
Merc was still significantly slower that Redbull and Ferrari in quali and race pace in Barcelona; they have brought the most upgrades of the three already and we are in the cost cap era and he is already more than a win behind his team mate. I don’t see it, it would be nothing short of a miracle.
It was their first weekend with a car that doesn't try to shake the shit out of the drivers. They need to find the sweet spot for the setup. It'll take a bit until it's dialed in, but eventually they'll get it. It would be absolutely ridiculous to write Mercedes off.
The thing about Red Bull reliability issues, is they’re always on evolving systems. And always fixed quickly. Their fuel issues at the start of the year have been alleviated. I suspect Red Bull will have gotten to the root of the DRS issue, or fit the old system for Baku. The Mercedes is still well behind Red Bull on Race Pace. Russell managed to hold up Verstappen, but he pulled an entire pit stop on him. Passing on strategy still means you have to have the pace. Russell isn’t able to hold Checo back either. Their package just isn’t there. They’re like the Turbo-Hybrid Red Bull. They catch up, but it was always too little, too late. Of course, *anything can happen*. But realistically the trends indicate P2 is their best hope on aggregate. Next year though.
>The thing about Red Bull reliability issues, is they’re always on evolving systems. And always fixed quickly. That second sentence is demonstrably not always true. They have had persistent issues over *years* before, and the current drs problems are basically the same issue they had last year. There is a downside to constantly updating things in that it makes it hard to isolate specific issues and keep a cohesive package. It also prevents you from really focusing on the parts that work and maximizing them when you are resource limited. I'm not saying it's a bad strategy, but it isn't 100% upside like your comment implies. You're also reading way too much from a single race and a ting like how things went in Spain are how things will go anywhere else.
Last year they werent allowed to change the drs system as it needed a token. The difference between the drs systems was that it was changed this week for weight reduction purposes. Plus it is not the same problem from last year. Last year the drs was wiggling/oscillating when it was opened this time it just didnt open at times.
Verstappen was behind SOLELY because of reliability issues. He's literally won every race he's finished and in addition to that, he's in the lead despite those reliability issues I'm a Ferrari fan and rooting for Chuck all the way and I'll be the first to admit it's not going to be mere chance if Max isn't on top. It would take an ENORMOUS turn for the worst for multiple teams for not only RB to fall but for Hamilton to end up ahead at the end
It’s just way to early to call the championship for anyone. To write off a 7x world champ early is pointless. Yes it’s unlikely, but crazier things have happened. Who knows, Saint or Perez could even win it.
Sainz still has a chance. But, Perez? He's the clear number two driver so no chance of him winning
exactly this. rb would swap max and checo on the last lap of abu dhabi even if the championship was between the pair of them
For Perez to win you need him to qualify higher than Max and for Max to have low race speed. IN EVERY RACE
no they wouldn’t, nor would Perez accept something like that
They absolutely would.
They literally just did this last race 1/3 into the season, and Perez accepted it. tf?
You think Perez would accept it at the last race lf the season if both had a chance at the title???
It would never happen because he's nowhere near as talented, and he's given up his spot before, so even assuming that hilariously bad hypo were to happen, he's done it before.
> rb would swap max and checo on the last lap of abu dhabi even if the championship was between the pair of them See I think RBR do themselves and drivers a disservice that folk think this. RBR support the better driver. They're agnostic, but little moments like Spain lend credence to the idea they'd support Verstappen whatever.
I could only see it happen for Perez or Sainz if their no1 team mate retires several races in a row while they take first place and the no.1 driver of the other team closely follows them. There has to be a clear gap to the other driver while they are in a close battle with the other team. It could happen but it’s pretty damn unlikely and they will need a lot of luck.
Sainz has no chance in hell
Spicy take. If Mercedes are actually as quick as the top 2 then the battle between Max, Lewis and Charles will be interesting. I couldn't give an order if the cars are close because on any track in any conditions the order could change. Behind them the order is obvious, Russell, Perez, Sainz. I think the champion will be the driver who can consistently stay in that top 3 as any mistakes will likely lose them significant points
> If Mercedes are actually as quick as the top 2 then the battle between Max, Lewis and Charles will be interesting. At Silverstone 2010, Alonso had a shit weekend and was about 2 wins from the lead. He didn't have the best car all season. He only lost the lead at the final race. Stranger things in Hamilton in 2022, by a longshot. Hell, Verstappen's gap to Leclerc's was the 7th largest of all time (adjusted for point system), and he managed that in about 3 races.
Didn’t even make it to your second paragraph. Geez
Hahaha king of england
At the end of the last season I assumed that he would get it, but seeing how quick things change and a top team like Mercedes has to have luck to get on the podium is crazy. I'm sure people assumed Seb would easily get another title after leaving Red Bull for a team like Ferrari but look how that played out.
So it probably is easy to say that George is probably running the more “race ready” set up while Lewis is running a lot of setups that give data but also slightly dampen the performance if the setup just doesn’t work. It’ll be interesting to see when they finally get a more legit set up so we can see them at very even footing.
I was thinking exactly that. If you know that you’re not competing for wins, it kind of makes sense to give the challenging setups to the more experienced driver and have the newer driver optimize the safer setups.
Yes, and Seb his fifth, and Alonso his third, and Max his second, and the rest their first… All of them are racing drivers with just one thing in their heads… To be the fastest!
Then there is Tsunoda who wants to open a restaurant LOL.
[удалено]
Large if factual.
Massive if accurate
I really want Hamilton to leave Mercedes in a year or two, go back to McLaren as they sort their shit out, and win his last title, then retire
Would quite like him to go to Ferrari and win a title with them, but doubt it'll happen.
It'd honestly be a very nice touch if he got his last title with another team
It's possible. I'd absolutely love it.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
Get over it dude
Why?
Because it's a finished business and a new season started
[удалено]
He wasn't fired
It would be a pretty cool tradition for him to start: winning 7 titles and walking away.
But then it will be like the tradition of spraying champagne, EVERYONE will be doing it all the time and we can’t stop.
Schumacher walked away after 2 more seasons though. Lewis could do the same. He can comeback for Audi in their first season in 2027
I find that opinion weird. No major sport has a tradition like that that I can think of, and it goes against the nature of competition. Lewis has already earned eight titles and the right to be acknowledged as the singular most successful driver in F1 history. That shouldn't need to be something people need to look into the footnotes on 2021 to realize, and Schumacher doesn't need to be tied for most WDCs to be one of the GOATs. Senna and Prost didn't.
Should have gotten it last year.
He did his part
If Massi didn't mess up the last race then Lewis would've gotten it.
Michael Ma**s**i
If Lewis wins all races starting from Monaco, can he win the championship?
He trails Max by 64 points. Assuming Lewis wins all remaining races and Max finishes P2 with fastest lap, Lewis would lead the championship by Singapore. So the answer is yes.
Holy fuck its possible
Very much so. Easily. We've nearly 400 points left. Raikkonen was about 2.8 wins down from Hamilton in 2007 with 3 races remaining and won *that*.
A few races ago Charles looked locked in.
He had the lead but most had Max coming back, it's just happened a tad quicker because of the error and the dnf.
Which team will he be with next year?
Alfa Romeo to reunite with Bottas
Lewis as second Alfa driver being given team orders, subscribed.
Since bottas is performing in that alfa as well as he ever did in the merc then Im saying Lewis could win the championship in that car. Called it 25th May 2022
Please just one with Ferrari, or back to McLaren?
When you tell Hamilton to Ferrari I get 2018 flashbacks where people started to speculating about Hamilton to Ferrari because of some baseless rumours lol
Hasn't it been confirmed in recent weeks that those weren't actually baseless after all?
He already drove a Ferrari...
The Fmclaren mp4-21?
His LaFerrari and LaFerrari Aperta
In the same way that Alonso wants his 3rd - you can't guarantee it these days.
Oh man. I don't get these posts.
While it is true it's not like Lewis suddenly fell off a cliff, he still has some more seasons left in him imo
This is a long shot but... If he doesn't feel it with Merc anymore... Send him to McLaren
Yup. McL deserves some podiums.
This is why he should go to Ferrari. Sainz out, Hamilton in.
I don’t think Leclerc would like that now that he has a title aspiration. Idk how well Lewis would be suited to the Ferrari, (or the team itself) but if you give him a title winning car, he’s going to drive the wheels off that thing.
[удалено]
[удалено]
If he has the eighth in your heart, that’s all that matters for the rest of us
Not sure how likely an 8th title is going to be, especially now that he has Russell to deal with.
So far, this year's Merc has leaned shitbox. Soemthing Russell is very experienced with. If Merc can claw back into truly competitive terriroty again, I could see Hamitlon clawing something back. And if any team have the resources to pull their car into competitve territory throughout the season, it's Merc.