Hamilton Laments Puncture After Collision With Piastri: 'Must Have Lost Like 40 Seconds'
F1
Lewis Hamilton reflected on his race result, influenced by two collisions that cost him valuable time during the 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The Mercedes driver went into the race, starting from a dangerous midfield position in P10. A lot of racing incidents tend to happen on the first lap of the race when in these kinds of positions, and unfortunately, Las Vegas was no exception.
Going into turn one on the first lap of the race, multiple drivers misjudged their breaking points went went wide, crashing into the backs of others.
One of the drivers who lost control of his car was Carlos Sainz, who crashed into the back of Lewis Hamilton, and the Mercedes driver lost multiple positions as a result. Hamilton told Sky Sports F1 after the race:
"It was a pretty challenging race. I started on the Hard tyre which was tricky at the beginning. I got hit by someone behind a big hit, I think it was from Carlos [Sainz] and I was just trying not to hit the cars that spun round and I fell back I think five or six places."
The seven-time World Champion then fought his way up into the fifth position before his pit window opened but collided with Oscar Piastri during an overtake in turn 14, which resulted in a puncture for the 38-year-old. He said:
"I don't really know exactly what happened. I thought I didn't have a puncture immediately, so I was accelerating, and just as I got alongside the pit lane entry, I felt the rear was moving, and I was too late to come in."
Because of missing the pit entry before he realized he had a puncture, Hamilton had to do a whole another lap during which he fell from fifth to eleventh position.
"So I had to do a whole slow lap. I must have lost like 40 seconds or something with everything, but grateful that I was able to come back."
Hamilton came out of the pits in P19 but managed to fight his way up the grid again to finish in P7 showing there was a decent pace in his Mercedes this weekend.
"There are strengths within that car, but sometimes it's just really hard to get the performance out of it."
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