Lewis Hamilton: “To be 1.8 seconds behind is a real kick in the teeth”

With the likes of Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris all taking grid penalties at this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix, the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team entered the weekend with their sights firmly set on back-to-back pole positions.

The team hasn’t achieved back-to-back poles since last season’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix and the Brackley-based teams wait will continue as both Lewis Hamilton and George Russell originally qualified in seventh and eighth position.

With the grid penalties taken into account Hamilton is set to start tomorrow’s Grand Prix on the second row of the grid in fourth place.

Despite the strong starting position for tomorrow’s Grand Prix, Hamilton was left disappointed with the sizeable gap between his Mercedes team and the likes of Oracle Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Ferrari. The seven-time world champion already appears to be switching his attention to the 2023 season as he called for his Mercedes team to regroup and come back stronger for next year.

“Everyone’s working hard for improvements, and we came here very optimistic that we’re going to close the gap, so to be 1.8 seconds behind is a real kick in the teeth but it is what it is. This is a car that we continue to struggle with, and I definitely won’t miss it at the end of the year.

“The other two teams ahead of us are in another league and we can’t keep relying on them to fall off. We have to regroup and make sure next year’s car is where we need it to be, and we’ll do the best we can with what we have for the rest of the season.”

Despite his W13 struggling with drag and aero balance around the Spa-Francorchamps Circuit this weekend, Hamilton has assured fans that he and his team will still try their best for a positive result in tomorrows Grand Prix.

“We were a little too draggy and the aero balance through the corners wasn’t stable so it’s very hard to work around that but we’ll try our best for tomorrow. Knowing how hard everyone is working, I’m gutted for the team because we’re giving it our all but it’s the fundamentals of this car – sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s really bad.”

George Russell: “When the temperatures are cold, we struggle”

Like his team-mate, Russell was left disheartened by the sizeable gap between Mercedes and the front runners during qualifying today.

The young British driver will line up on the third row of the grid in fifth position as a result of the grid penalties handed out for new engine components to the usual front runners of the grid.

Russell chalked up Mercedes’ struggles today in qualifying down to the low temperatures experienced around the Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

“It’s difficult to comprehend how we were on pole in the last race but 1.8 seconds off today, and we aren’t just losing time to Max, we were six tenths behind the Alpines. When the temperatures are cold, we struggle and as we also saw in Imola this year, we find it difficult to get the tyres working.”

Despite being off the pace today in qualifying, Russell remains confident that his W13 will be better suited for the race conditions tomorrow against the McLaren F1 Team and BWT Alpine F1 Team. 

However, he did state that the front runners will still hold up to a one-second advantage over the Silver Arrows in race trim tomorrow.

“I’m confident we’ll have a lot more pace tomorrow compared to the Alpines, McLarens and the Williams too, but we will still be 0.5s/1.0s behind Red Bull and Ferrari. We need to look overnight to try and understand our pace but it’s good to get qualifying out of the way, it has been a weak point for us, and I’m sure we’ll be faster tomorrow.”

With another disappointing qualifying session behind Mercedes, Russell issued a rallying call to his team as they search for a positive result in tomorrow’s race.

“Mercedes qualifying P7 and P8 is not where we want to be, and we know that’s not where the car is, so we’ve got work to do tomorrow to get a good result.”

Credit: Daimler AG