Lewis Hamilton Managed to Change Mercedes’ F1 Strategies: Nico Rosberg

Strategies play a crucial role in winning races and championships in F1. A team has to make quick decisions by analyzing the situation during a race and react quickly to situations. This means the team in the paddock and the driver in the car have to be in sync with each other to make the strategy work. While most drivers follow team orders without question, some drivers such as Lewis Hamilton have the power to change the strategies.

2016 F1 world champion Nico Rosberg had an interesting take on strategy calls. The world champion was explaining how to master the Baku street circuit when he called the track and some of its corners “one of the most dangerous of the entire season.”

“As a driver, you can give a strong opinion in team strategy, like Lewis does”- Rosberg

While conducting a Q/A session in his latest YouTube video, a user had asked Rosberg: ‘How much power do drivers have on team strategy calls?’.

The explanation by former Mercedes world champion was very interesting.

“It’s just so difficult as a driver to have an overview because team strategy depends so much also on where everybody else is on the racetrack,” said Rosberg.

He continued by mentioning how Lewis Hamilton has influenced the team strategies.

“As a driver, you can give a strong opinion, like Lewis does. Lewis sometimes has actually managed to change the team’s take on strategy.  By saying, ‘hey my tires are good let me go, I want to go long.’ But it’s very rare and very hard because the team just has so much more information.”

Watch this story: Ugliest moments of Hamilton-Rosberg Rivalry 

Will Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton bounce back from Monaco GP?

Mercedes had a horrible Monaco Grand Prix; both of their drivers failed to impress on the Streets of Monte-Carlo. Lewis Hamilton started 7th and finishes 7th and Bottas was forced to retire after the pit-stop mishap.

The Silver Arrows were definitely not at their A-game. They were not fast enough on the track and alert enough on the paddock for strategic decisions. The race got away from them in a matter of a few laps.

During the race, the team had called Hamilton for a pit stop to jump Gasly in for P6, but he ended up losing 3 places to Vettel, Perez, and Gasly to fall back to 7th. The strategy to undercut has always backfired in the Principality, but in their eagerness, they blundered on their strategy.

Read more: Who is Peter ‘Bono’ Bonnington, the Man Behind the Success of Lewis Hamilton?

Baku is another street circuit where Mercedes and Bottas won in 2019. So it would be interesting to see how the world champions will use strategic decisions to succeed.

Do you think Mercedes will bounce back in Baku? Comment below to let us know.