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Lewis Hamilton believes this weekend was the best he has had in a year when it comes to his performance. Speaking to the media including Sportskeeda, the Briton felt his race was compromised with balance issues and third is the highest he could have finished in the 2023 Hungarian GP.
Reflecting upon the qualifying session from the previous day, Hamilton said:
“I haven’t been my best for over a year. Yesterday, I think yesterday felt like it was me being back to my best.”
Commenting on where he expected to finish in the race, he added:
“I think we may have been able to finish third if we had a slightly better start, but fourth is ok.”
Asked by Sportskeeda if he could have started chasing Sergio Perez earlier after his pit-stop, Lewis Hamilton replied:
“No, no, no. We were just too slow in the first two stints. Just the balance was not good, the car was too slow and then the balance picked up a lot at the end and, all of a sudden, I was able to apply the pressure and then it was too late.”
Probed further if his start performance had undertones of the fear of clashing with Max Verstappen, he responded:
“That’s not gonna stop me. Just got a little bit of wheel-spin and then a big compromise after that.”
Starting on pole position after the 2021 Saudi Arabian GP with his old title rival next to him, Lewis Hamilton was certain he did not let the Dutchman get under his skin.
He explained that he had a wheel spin at the start and later his performance was compromised with balance issues. The seven-time world champion told Sportskeeda that by the time his car felt like it was in the right window towards the end, he had already lost time.
Losing three places at the start, the British champion had a tough race ahead with poor performance on the first two sets of tyres. He believes his unsuccessful attempt at closing in on Perez to grab third place was hampered by balance issues.
The Mercedes driver felt his tyre performance was inconsistent and did not help him fight his way back to the podium.
Lewis Hamilton was aware of his minimal chances of victory in Hungary
Not disappointed by the race result, Lewis Hamilton admitted being aware of their lack of pace to hold the position during the race. In the press conference after qualifying, he had pointed out Red Bull’s incredible race pace from the long run simulations on Friday.
He claims Mercedes had made him aware of the reality where they were half-a-second behind Red Bull in terms of pure pace. Therefore, their realistic target was their customer team McLaren, who have recently unlocked some good performance after their upgrade.
Asked if he was disappointed with the race result, Lewis Hamilton said:
“No, I am still (positive). I think its obvious that we are not the quickest, we don’t have the quickest car, and I’m really proud of myself and the job that we did yesterday to get pole position, to outperform the world champion and the other guy that was quicker, the other two cars that were quicker than us. And today is just, its reality. The reality is we are not fast enough. They already told me the strategy this morning that I would be at least 5/10ths slower than Red Bull. So the fight was not with Max. We were hoping that we could fight the McLarens. But the McLaren was second and was too quick.”
Asked what changed from qualifying to the race, he said:
“Just the balance of the car shifting through the race."
Despite the result, Lewis Hamilton was proud of his team, their efforts throughout the weekend. He felt it was commendable that Mercedes were able to out-qualify or outperform both the Red Bulls and McLaren cars in the qualifying.
For Mercedes in 2023, their car has often lacked the qualifying pace and has been better during the races. However, their inconsistent car performance has often made it difficult to determine their spot in the pecking order.
With the midfield bunching up, there are at least three teams that could be fighting for the second place in the constructors' standings as the season progresses.
