“Not Enough”: Mercedes Reveal Major Lewis Hamilton F1 Setback

After a painful start to the season, both physically and metaphorically, Lewis Hamilton finally has something to be happy about. The Briton finished a race with manageable porpoising, and to top it all, on a podium. Hamilton had been struggling more than his teammate George Russell with the W13, but this might be a thing of the past.

This now allows the world champion and Mercedes to shift their focus a bit. And the first area they need to shift their attention to is the race pace, which is lacking. The biggest example of this was the gap between them and the frontrunners, Red Bull and Ferrari. In the Canadian Grand Prix, Hamilton was six seconds behind Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz.

However, the gap to the leaders does not paint the full picture as pointed out by the technical director Mike Elliott. Mercedes’s biggest asset at the moment is its tire management, which gives them the pace to compete with the rest.

Pointing this out, Elliott said in Mercedes’ post-Canada debrief video, “I think it is really encouraging to see Lewis be able to tag onto the back of the front two. I think we looked like we were in decent shape with the degradation with the tyres.” 

Having said that, the technical director also admitted, “…while he backed off for a few laps he then set a pretty quick lap on the penultimate lap, so the pace was there in the car but not enough pace to challenge for the win, unfortunately”

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This is not something that the fans of the 7-time world champion would like to hear. But with the evident improvements in the W13, Hamilton can certainly expect more pace from his car ahead of his home GP.

Lewis Hamilton might not break this record in 2022

The seven-time world champion has nearly broken or equaled every record set by Michael Schumacher. The world championship title record is unlikely to be broken this season. However, there’s one more record Hamilton might have to wait to achieve, where he currently stands on equal footing with Schumacher.

Both Hamilton and Schumacher have a record of eight wins in a particular Grand Prix. Hamilton has eight wins in the British and Hungarian GP, while Schumacher has the same amount in French GP.

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And with this season’s bouncing and struggling W13, it is a bit unlikely that Hamilton will break the record this year.