Lewis Hamilton Reveals Reason Behind Lack of Overtakes During the Italian Grand Prix

Following a P7 finish owing to an in-race penalty, Lewis Hamilton states it has become quite tough to overtake after the ban on the ‘quali’ modes. Hamilton was leading the race, but following a prohibited pit-stop entry, he was penalized with a 10 seconds stop and go penalty. Resuming the race, he found himself in the 16th position. However, he pulled himself back and finished in the 7th position.

Hamilton believes that due to the usage of a single-engine mode, it was fairly difficult to overtake. Calling out the regulation as something which is “worse for racing”, Hamilton has expressed his fury with the single-engine mode regulation imposed by FIA.

“We’re just in one mode, and it’s a fast mode that we would use to race on a much shorter part of the race, so the engine felt consistent,” Hamilton explained. 

“The only thing is that it’s worse for racing in the sense of in the past you could move between modes and you had to manage the small amount of strong race engine mode because you only have a certain quota.

“It was more fun to have to manage that and manage the power and utilize it for overtaking. I would imagine that’s probably why you see less overtaking then and perhaps in the past”

Lewis Hamilton tried his best

Hamilton is known to have a staggering pace across the tracks. Seeing him struggle to overcome the cars up ahead, everyone was taken by surprise. Justifying his slow pace, Hamilton presented the reality regarding the ban of the “quali mode”.

“That’s why I wasn’t overtaking a huge amount or had a fast pace,” he said. “When I came out [of the pits] I saw that I had a massive gap and it wasn’t really closing anywhere near as fast as I’d like. I was already on lap 20-odd by the time I came out and was sure I was going to catch them at some stage. But then I caught up and I couldn’t get by, so it didn’t feel great that’s for sure. And I had to use up a lot of more tires to even catch the back of the train. I did the best I could.”

Hunt for the 90th Grand Prix win is on

The Italian Grand Prix in Monza could’ve been his 90th Grand Prix victory. With his unfortunate penalty, he slipped down the grid even after leading for the most part of the race.

Lewis Hamilton sits comfortably at the top of the driver’s list in the World Championship. Even though he’d have loved the win at Monza, he still has a lot of races left to unleash his best and own them. Looking towards his 7th World Championship title, Hamilton wants to touch the feat by accumulating as many points he can.