Hamilton struggled at Marina Bay Circuit, finishing 12th in the first practice hour and outside the top ten in FP2. He finished 11th in the second practice session.
Hamilton admits that Mercedes’ struggles to optimize the set-up on the W15 are so severe that he may struggle to advance to the pole position shootout. “At the moment, we won’t be going into Q3,” Hamilton assessed. “It’s very difficult. A very challenging day.
We tried everything set-up wise and nothing seems to work. So definitely very challenging. “We’re giving it everything and then you find out you’re a second off.
The British driver agreed with Hamilton’s assessment, saying the German brand needs to put in a lot of work over the course of the night to put itself in a more competitive position.
“Friday was really tough for us,” he declared. “We need to figure out why we weren’t going as fast as we could today. I’m sure we’ll figure it out tonight.”