Hamilton Urges Mercedes To Investigate Strange Issue That Killed His Qualifying In Canada

Wednesday, 12 June 2024 at 15:00

Speaking after Sunday's race, Lewis Hamilton described a strange problem that might have contributed to his poor Saturday qualifying result.

Coming into the race weekend in Montreal for the ninth round of the 2024 season, Mercedes introduced upgrades that seemed to have solved their cars' problems.

Silver Arrows seemed to be the fastest overall team from the start of the first practice session, and the seven-time World Champion felt confident at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, one of his favorites and the one where he scored his first-ever win.

The German team retained their form moving into qualifying, as George Russell secured the pole position. However, it wasn't the same for his 39-year-old teammate.

Although he seemed quite fast at times during the qualifying session, Hamilton ended up with "only" the seventh fastest time.

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This compromised the Briton's whole race, and he didn't have much of a chance to compete for the race win from that point on. Ultimately, he crossed the finish line on Sunday in P4. Speaking to the media after the race, Hamilton said, according to Planet F1:

"Well, the tires were working throughout the weekend. Then we got to qualifying, and every time I went out of the garage, my tires were for some reason below on temperature."

"Every set was two or three degrees lower than it should have been, and you can't catch it up, and I couldn't switch the tires on after that. That's something we have to really look at because something went on with the blankets, I guess."

F1 teams are allowed to use special heating tire blankets to keep drivers' tires at a certain temperature before leaving the pits. This provides drivers with a better grip and makes it easier for them to set the tires to the optimal temperature once they are on track.

Would Hamilton have qualified better had he not had this problem? We won't find out. His next chance to show what he's got comes next week in Barcelona, a track that suited Mercedes very well last year.