Lewis Hamilton had an eventful weekend at the Miami Grand Prix that was full of ups and downs. He got off to a strong start during the opening practice session and secured an impressive P2 position. However, his performance took a turn for the worse on Saturday, and he ended up qualifying in 13th place.
But Sunday was a different story altogether, as Hamilton’s W14 car showed remarkable performance during the race, allowing him to stage an impressive comeback. Despite his disappointing qualifying position, he managed to finish the race in 6th place, thanks to his excellent driving skills.
The two Mercedes drivers, Hamilton and George Russell, took different approaches to the race. Hamilton started on hard compound tyres, while Russell began the race on medium compound tyres.
After Russell’s pit stop, the 25-year-old driver displayed superior pace during the final stretch, prompting Mercedes to request that Hamilton avoid holding up his teammate. Hamilton complied with the request but made it clear that he would not compromise his own speed.
As a result, Russell overtook Hamilton and secured an impressive fourth-place finish by overtaking Carlos Sainz towards the end of the race. Hamilton, on the other hand, finished in sixth place.
According to Schumacher, the seven-time World Champion was not pleased with the call made by his team. In his post-race column for Sky Deutschland, he wrote: “Lewis Hamilton is currently going to be extremely seething.”
“He’s not used to not winning. He wants attention, you can always see that in his outfits.
“In Miami he landed behind his team-mate George Russell. This is a maximum penalty for Hamilton.”
Hamilton expressed disappointment at finishing over 50 seconds behind race winner Max Verstappen and hopes that the upgrades for the Imola race will be worth a second.
However, he acknowledges that this is not feasible, and Toto Wolff agrees that the upgrades will be a step in the right direction, but they are unlikely to improve the car by half a second.
Ralf Schumacher is confident that Mercedes can make significant improvements to the car despite the challenges they face.
“Whether Red Bull will be dangerous again this season will become apparent in Europe when the many updates come,” he said. “Where you can always hope is that Red Bull doesn’t get the best out of the car. Then there might be a chance for someone else.
“Especially Mercedes could be expected again after the updates, I don’t trust the other teams that much.
“Mercedes is coming to Europe with a whole new concept. I expect a significant increase, otherwise they have a real problem.”
