Lewis Hamilton’s Miami GP weekend didn’t get off to the best of starts after he failed to make it to SQ3. Shortly after the session ended, Hamilton took to his Instagram story to reassure fans that Mercedes is working at full flow to rectify the situation.
Hamilton stated that the team was not giving up and promised his fans that the slump will soon be over. He said,
“Not the best today. All I can say is please know that we are working as hard as we can, we are giving it everything and we won’t give up. We will get past this.”
Hamilton was not the only Mercedes driver to get knocked out of SQ2, as George Russell joined him in the process. The latter secured a P11 starting position, one place ahead of Hamilton’s P12 but hopes were much higher from the Brackley-based outfit, especially because of Hamilton’s P2 finish in the Sprint race just two weeks ago in China.
“Not the best today. All I can say is please know that we are working as hard as we can, we are giving it everything and we won’t give up. We will get past this.”—Lewis via IG story #MiamiGP pic.twitter.com/mriJkBOAlv
— Sir Lewis Updates (@LH44updates) May 4, 2024
Mercedes will also be disappointed because the team brought their first upgrade of the season to Miami. However, it was all for naught and the W15 seems to be falling off further.
Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg rubbed salt on Mercedes’ wounds by outperforming Hamilton and Russell to make it to Q3 in the end. Given the situation, Hamilton feels that the Silver Arrows need to stop being delusional.
Lewis Hamilton asks Mercedes to accept their fate
Following yet another dismal session, Hamilton wants Mercedes to accept the reality that their car is slow. He felt that the car was good in P1 and also the Sprint qualifying session. Still, being seven-tenths off the leaderboard just shows that the W15 is not fast enough.
Hamilton is not too optimistic about the Sprint race in Miami that takes place on Saturday. He doesn’t see himself making many moves to get past drivers on pure pace at the Miami International Autodrome. As quoted by Fox Sports, he said,
“I think the sprint race is going to be tough. We’re in 12th so don’t expect a huge amount from there to be honest. It’s not an easy circuit to overtake on or to follow.”
Work to do for the Silver Arrows tomorrow #F1Sprint #MiamiGP pic.twitter.com/MjS3IRZiHL
— Formula 1 (@F1) May 3, 2024
Attention once again gets drawn to the upgrades that Mercedes brought. The improvements did little to help the German team and Hamilton confirmed that they are done experimenting with aggressive appraoches.
Per the seven-time World Champion, Mercedes extracted every bit of performance from the car. They just need to accept the fact that they will only be fighting for points somehow.
