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At this point in his career and with the current state of affairs at Mercedes, Ham has lost his desire and consequently patience to think through and execute a good race. He only wakes up if the car is capable of winning, anything lesser doesn't matter. That's perfectly ok for someone that has achieved everything in F1 and only thing that motivates him is the opportunity to win. But to take his washed out qualifying (other than singapore) and race performaces and justify there were other reasons why he didn't perform and blame everything under the sun, is a moot point. He has had off weekends in his prime even when he had a car to win. So dropping shoulders when the car isn't to his liking, isn't out of ordinary.
At this point in his career and with the current state of affairs at Mercedes, Ham has lost his desire and consequently patience to think through and execute a good race.
Apart from his entire mid season, whereby he showed plenty of desire, banked two wins, 4th in Canada/Austria and two more podiums in Spain & Hungary. I think those results show he can execute good races.
Hamilton didnt have a good race but it was deemed to be bad when we all saw he was on softs at the start. That`s why, I dont blame him for the bad performance today. If he had mediums and pitted around the same lap with Russel and still finished behind Russell, then I could say that his performance was bad
Baffling strategy from Mercedes to be honest. Gamble with Medium and Hard across both, rather than the soft that clearly wasn't really going to last long enough considering the number of medium shod drivers behind them.
Data to ponder upon who was pushing and who wasn't.
Russell was managing his tyres in his second stint and that's why his times were very consistent till the end.
Ham started easy on his second stint, then started pushing. Then his tyres fell away.
Russell's fastest lap was on 30th lap (3rd lap of second stint).
Ham's came on 43rd lap (26th lap of second stint).
Going by that, if Russell would have pushed in his second stint, he would have lost the ability to hold up Leclerc to the end. But if he did push, then the delta to Ham would have been bigger in the beginning of his stint. It just shows how well Russell managed his stint. Remember, just like Ham had cars in front of him in second stint, Russell had Ham in front of him in the first stint and yet, managed a consistent stint throughout.
Good point.
Of the two, Russell had the better of the pace yesterday. But that doesn't surprise when it was apparent that Hamilton kept overheating the rears whenever he tried to increase his pace. Poor setup for the race that ended up favouring qualifying more?
Russell spent most of his first stint behind Ham, but also ran a good long stint by keeping those mediums alive when Ham pitted. Ham complained of tyres after a bunch of laps on hards, whereas Russell managed to keep a charging Leclerc behind, who had far better pace. That's the standout race pace difference between the two Merc drivers. Ham's pace on a few laps old hards was just about the same as Russell who was on mediums in his first stint.
People are discounting Russell's ability to manage his race pace. He has vastly improved on that front, while keeping his qualifying speed.
Is there no reason you could see why a driver who knows hes pitted way too early onto a tyre expecred to go to the end of the race would maybe have an overall lower lap delta vs a driver who goes onto those tyres 11 laps later and therefore has 11 laps less wear to manage till the end of the race?
Isnt it obvious?
Data to ponder upon who was pushing and who wasn't.
Russell was managing his tyres in his second stint and that's why his times were very consistent till the end.
Ham started easy on his second stint, then started pushing. Then his tyres fell away.
Russell's fastest lap was on 30th lap (3rd lap of second stint).
Ham's came on 43rd lap (26th lap of second stint).
Going by that, if Russell would have pushed in his second stint, he would have lost the ability to hold up Leclerc to the end. But if he did push, then the delta to Ham would have been bigger in the beginning of his stint. It just shows how well Russell managed his stint. Remember, just like Ham had cars in front of him in second stint, Russell had Ham in front of him in the first stint and yet, managed a consistent stint throughout.
The team shafted Hamilton regardless, I bet they never told him that Russell was lapping faster than him after he boxed for the hards. They clearly knew that Russell was going to overcut him even without the mistake that sealed it when he tried to pass Yuki.
Ferrari of 2022, McLaren of 2024 have often been at the receiving end of 'clown strategy' decisions. But we must remember, they were all under the pressure of 'time' and a 'live race'. Compared to that, the decision to go for S for Hamilton before the race even started , has by far been the biggest 'blunder wearing a gamble/punt' disguise in my recent memory.
If starting beyond 10th place, it makes sense since the tyre offset and pace offset with midfielder teams can help quickly gain a few places in the first 5/6 laps, in such a difficult-to-overtake track ; because that is the kind of 'delta' needed (look what Sainz did after pitting - car's inherent pace AND tyres, both have to have advantage).
Hamilton was starting 3rd, alongwith cars that had similar (for arguments sake) pace. So, even if he jumped to P1, and then ran as the head of the train slowing the two faster cars down, he will have to pit first anyway, because the nature of the traction zones would've ensured that Norris and Max would have cancelled out Hamilton's tyre advantage after lap 5/6 and would've been fast enough (car advantage and tyre advantage, both) to pass Hamilton by lap10.
So, it was not a case of hoping to run until lap 20-22 on the S, keeping P1. Track position is important, of course, but not with tyres that will wither away in less than 10 laps.
On top of this, coming to the pits 'earliest' would've anyway meant that Norris/Verstappen would get free air running on their Ms anyway for atleast 10 more laps ; which would in turn mean that towards the end of the race, they would atleast have a 10 lap fresher hard tyres. So the 'Singapore means track position' edict has no meaning in that case either, because unlike Monaco, where overtaking is impossible and hence running a long first stint = getting stuck behind midfielder trains on fresh tyres, isn't the case here. There were 4 DRS zones and tyre advantage will help execute DRS passes.
So what were they hoping to achieve staring on S ?
On used S, not new.
With full tank fuel, not with near empty tank.
This S start, would've made sense in Monaco, where it's impossible to overtake, not in a track with 4 DRS zones, where the newly added one is such that there are only two highspeed corners between it and the pit straight DRS zone. Even there, it hinges on the S making the difference with a very short run to T1.
As a F1-watcher for more than 2 decades, it doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever, because I've never seen such a hopeless use of "softer compound to gain position" for the race start. There is not even a long run to T1, so the opportunity for gaining an advantage is even lesser.
Without bothering about who 'suggested' an S start, I am staggered that the 'multiple approvals, including driver' that the decision has to filter through, before being deployed, didn't see the pathetically low weightage to the "reward" component in the risk v/s reward equation.
The other frustrating thing is why they didn’t at any point consider changing the strategy to a two stopper. Maybe he beats leclerc on a two stopper. But wait he might have gotten Russell also. So yeah that cannot happen. Understood. .
The other frustrating thing is why they didn’t at any point consider changing the strategy to a two stopper. Maybe he beats leclerc on a two stopper. But wait he might have gotten Russell also. So yeah that cannot happen. Understood. .
Ferrari of 2022, McLaren of 2024 have often been at the receiving end of 'clown strategy' decisions. But we must remember, they were all under the pressure of 'time' and a 'live race'. Compared to that, the decision to go for S for Hamilton before the race even started , has by far been the biggest 'blunder wearing a gamble/punt' disguise in my recent memory.
Hamilton is part of the strategy decision making process. He could have said NO at any point in that process.
Without bothering about who 'suggested' an S start, I am staggered that the 'multiple approvals, including driver' that the decision has to filter through, before being deployed, didn't see the pathetically low weightage to the "reward" component in the risk v/s reward equation.
Doesn't Lewis really have no say about his tires? In recent years, George has called the shots in the middle of the race to change tires against the team's will, for example, Zandvoort '22 and I think in other races too. Russell likes to gamble on tires.
