“What Is Keeping Me Up at Night…”: As Mercedes Problems Pile On, 37-Year-Old Lewis Hamilton Reveals the Questions Haunting Him

One would have loved the drama if Lewis Hamilton would have been able to snatch the title away from Max Verstappen this season. Even better if that happened in a last-day thriller. Unfortunately, that’s not how it is going to be this time around.

Lewis Hamilton is possibly having his worst F1 season ever. There is a fairly large possibility that he goes the full season without a race win, the first time that will happen in his long, illustrious career.

He was asked about his take on his season so far. He candidly replied, “We would love to be in that battle fighting [for the title], and I wish that all the cars were a lot closer and we were all having a much better battle closer to the front.”

“But that’s not the way our sport is. So I don’t worry about that — it’s not something I can control at the moment. I just focus on what I can and that is trying to do a better job with what we have got. My worry, what is keeping me up at night is: what have I left out? Who do I need to speak to at the track? How can I support my engineers? In the aero department, how can I support them to make better choices for the next car?”, he said.

“When I damage the car, I take money away from the budget and I’m like, ‘Oh, God! Don’t do that!’ And so that’s really what I’ve been focusing on and I’m hoping when we come back in February next year, the car touches the ground and it does what we hope it does.”, he explained.

Read More: 103 GP Winner Lewis Hamilton Breaks Double Decade Long F1 Streak

What Lewis is going through this season is a cycle that every sportsperson has to go through in their career. What matters is how they pick themselves up and come back to their best.

Lewis Hamilton and the R-word question

As Lewis made a jaded comment about Mercedes’ inability to challenge for the title this season (at the end of Imola), the first questions raised were – is he going to leave?

While there are no signals from Mercedes or Lewis regarding him being replaced, it is a question worth asking. He is out of contract at the end of the season. George Russell has been performing well and looks ready to take the reins.

Lewis meanwhile said, “Definitely [will race next year for Mercedes], because it’s going to take longer than one year [to get back to the front of the grid]. I think if we had just won the title last year and then we would win again this year, definitely life would be in a different place and I’d be on a different course.”

Watch This Story: From Lewis Hamilton to Max Verstappen – How F1 Drivers Train

Winning and losing are a part of sports and life. While fans would have loved for Lewis to continue on his hot streak for eternity, that was not possible. But the bigger takeaway is how you deal with losing. “When the going gets tough, the tough get going” is how it is.