"Night and day difference", claims Hamilton after becoming Driver of the Day with a brilliant drive in Bahrain
Following a tough qualifying session on Saturday, Ferrari's seven-time F1 champion Lewis Hamilton made a more promising impression in Sakhir to record his best Sunday result with the Scuderia.
He may have struggled for pace on Saturday, but Lewis Hamilton did plenty to impress on race day. The seven-time F1 champion had a quiet start to his 57-lap race, starting from ninth on the grid.
Ferrari pursued an offset strategy with both Hamilton and his team-mate Charles Leclerc which saw them approach the opening laps with patience only to unleash Ferrari's pace later on after their rivals had pitted. Hamilton then went on to deliver the most impressive middle stint of the race, pulling off a series of audacious passes on several drivers including Andrea Kimi Antonelli and reigning champion Max Verstappen.
The seven-time world champion end up fifth at the flag, which was enough for him to be voted Driver of the Day with 29.6 percent, beating Oscar Piastri (14.1 percent), Leclerc (7.8 percent), Lando Norris (6.7 percent) and Pierre Gasly (6.5 percent).
Reflecting on his fourth race with the Scuderia, Hamilton claimed that he enjoyed his SF25 on Sunday much more than in qualifying.
"[The feeling is] night and day different. Of course, hard afternoon – to progress was not easy out there, everyone is so close. I know what to search for now.
“The car is sometimes quite hard to drive and I’m really working hard to adapt my driving style so that’s really what I’ve got to do. Also get the set-up where I need it, we got a much better set-up where I moved to where Charles was and he didn’t move away from that all weekend.
"I think just getting the confidence in that and then adjusting the driving style to it. But the team did a great job with the pit stops today and the strategy.”
"The car had good pace, and I was able to push while mantaining a performance window I hadn’t been able to reach in previous races. The balance faded a little on the hard compound, but I’m pleased, Grazie to the team - the strategy and pit stops were really well executed and made a real difference to the race."
On the back of a difficult race weekend last time out in Japan, Sunday’s race pace has given Hamilton confidence that he will soon be able to unlock the car’s one lap potential on a regular basis.
“I learned a lot today, and as I saw, that middle stint I was really in line with the car and I had the pace and I was moving forwards, I need that at the beginning and the end and I need that in Qualifying so I know what to search for now," concluded Hamilton.
