Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Mercedes AMG F1 W14. 02.09.2023. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 15, Italian Grand Prix, Monza, Italy, Qualifying Day.
Lewis Hamilton says he encountered a qualifying session “definitely harder than normal” at the Italian Grand Prix after wounding up eighth overall.
Having survived a late scare to progress to Q3, Hamilton could only post a time good enough for the fourth row, four places behind team-mate George Russell.
The seven-time World Champion notes that he lost the entirety of his eventual 0.2s deficit to Russell in the latter part of the lap.
“I lost it all in the second or last sector,” Hamilton conceded afterwards. “I was up in the first and a bit of the second, but I was just struggling with the car.”
Hamilton’s struggles over a single lap continued on from last weekend, where he admitted he was “slow” upon slumping to a Q2 exit on Saturday at Zandvoort.
Despite underlining he is optimistic Mercedes will return to competing at the top after penning a new two-year contract earlier this week, the Briton is not expecting the German marque’s qualifying fortunes to change with its current W14 car.
“Our car in general is very hard to optimise, there’s nothing easy about this car,” he rued.
Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Mercedes AMG F1 W14. 02.09.2023. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 15, Italian Grand Prix, Monza, Italy, Qualifying Day
Prior to the summer break, Hamilton notched his first pole position in this cycle of technical regulations and his first since December 2021 in Hungary.
Hamilton acknowledges that he has suffered a dip in form on his side of the garage in qualifying since then, attributing the behaviour of the tyres to his troubles.
“Before, up until Budapest, it was looking quite good,” Hamilton addressed. “Then tyres play a big factor, and these past two [rounds] we’ve just been so-so.”
“This qualifying session was definitely harder than normal.”
Meanwhile, Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff asserts that the Brackley-based squad arrived at Monza already anticipating it would be on the back foot against its rivals.
“We were 1.2 seconds off last year. We knew that low downforce wouldn’t suit us after Spa and Baku,” he stated.
“The car should be quick everywhere, but these were the problematic tracks and considering the time gap from our quicker car to the front guys, I think we have more reason to be semi-satisfied.”
Wolff added: “When you look at the top speeds, I’ve just looked at the sheet, we’re bottom-end pretty much everywhere. But you can still be high drag and not fast on the straight and still put out a good lap time. But overall generally I think we have been too draggy for Monza, definitely.”
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