The weekend of the Mercedes team in Imola left a bittersweet taste, as one of its drivers, George Russell, got a fourth position that gives some very valuable points for the end of the season after seeing the level of the W13 at the moment, while Lewis Hamilton was stuck in 14th place.
The seven-time world champion was unable to feel comfortable, both in dry and wet conditions, starring in a discreet performance in qualifying on Friday and not being able to overtake in the races on Saturday and Sunday.
After running more than 42 laps behind Pierre Gasly’s AlphaTauri, the Briton crossed the finish line receiving a radio message from the same team boss, Toto Wolff , who apologized for not providing him with a better car.
This is surprising because it is rare to hear this figure of the team speak on the radio directly with the driver, instead of the track engineer, but at Mercedes they are aware that they must raise Hamilton’s spirits in order to recover the lost level.
The German team’s engineering manager, Andrew Shovlin , was annoyed that the seven-time world champion was not given a competitive car, and defends that the reason for the poor performance was not because of the English driver.
“Lewis [Hamilton] had a difficult weekend from start to finish, and it was not his fault,” Shovlin explained in a statement provided to press by Mercedes. “At the tire change, some cars got ahead of us, we lost some time with a slow stop, and then Esteban [Ocon] got in front of him in the pitlane.”
“He got stuck in a DRS train and it was impossible to pass,” said the Brackley team engineer, who hopes to improve the W13 that is giving the seven-time champion so many problems before the next appointment at the Miami Grand Prix.
“We know where we are now with our performance. However, there are some serious hiccups with the car which, if we can fix, we’ll be able to make up a lot of the gap quite quickly,” said the Briton.
“But time is critical, and we have to make progress in the next two races if we want to keep the top finishers in our grasp this year,” Shovlin said.
