For the first time this year, Lewis Hamilton’s manager at Mercedes, Toto Wolff, made light of the fact that the seven-time champion was content with his W14’s performance after he tied his season-high finish of second in the Mexican Grand Prix.
Hamilton, a British driver, has a reputation for complaining on the radio during his 17-year Formula 1 career. Hamilton is willing to get his way, regardless of whether he is claiming that his tires are going to blow off, that the pit strategy is flawed, or even that the safety car is moving too slowly.
The recent struggles of Mercedes have certainly tested Hamilton’s patience, with the 38-year-old having raced in some of the least competitive machinery of his career over the last two seasons. Very rarely has Hamilton praised the W14 for meeting expectations, but in Mexico it seemed that the car and driver were finally in tandem.
After Hamilton finished in second place, team manager Wolff made a joke about how happy he was with the car for the first time this season.
I believe that today was the first time he said, “The car is actually good!” However, the drive was exceptionally brilliant, and the performance exhibits these oscillations. We’re not really sure because the tires stick sometimes and don’t.
We were grinning since the car was powerful. We had a huge lead on the final medium-fastest lap, I believe, once Lewis was in free air. It worked well.
Mercedes on the verge of triumph?
It has been a year since Mercedes last won a race, with George Russell claiming victory at Interlagos in 2022, but they have come close to the mark a few times this season. Following the battle for victory between Hamilton and Max Verstappen in Austin, it seems like it is only a matter of time before the German team are back on top – if they can avoid penalties like the one which robbed Hamilton’s podium finish in the US.
When questioned about how likely he thought Mercedes was to win, Wolff cited improved qualifying and straight line speed as crucial elements.
Uncertain,” Wolff remarked. We’ve been saying “we could have” but we didn’t for a few weekends now. Possibly in straight line speed, it wouldn’t have been as competitive against Max, but who knows? I believe we need to improve our qualifying. There is a pace.