Despite a heavily damaged Ferrari from the very first lap of the Belgian Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton believes he had the potential to aim for victory at Spa.
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Lewis Hamilton is convinced that Ferrari had the speed to win the Belgian Grand Prix. But the Briton believes that his clash with George Russell on the very first lap ruined his chances of victory.
The seven-time world champion ultimately finished fourth at Spa-Francorchamps, after receiving a five-second penalty for causing the collision with his former teammate at Mercedes.
A Ferrari deprived of much of its downforce
The contact with Russell caused significant damage to Hamilton’s Ferrari, considerably affecting its performance level throughout the race.
According to the Briton, he was driving with a particularly large loss of aerodynamic downforce.
“We had the pace to win today. But we had this damage. Despite that, the pace was still very good, even though I was driving with about 50 points less aerodynamic downforce. Under those conditions, I gladly take this result.”
Struggles until the checkered flag
Hamilton explains that the damage made his Ferrari very difficult to drive throughout the race.
Added to this was a new incident during his pit stop. After hitting a mechanic while leaving, Ferrari was ultimately unable to make the planned adjustment on the front wing.
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The Briton believes this increased the understeer of his car in the final stint.
“The car was really difficult to drive with the damage. I gave it my all, but during the last stop, we couldn’t change the front wing. I ended up with a lot of understeer.”
“I struggled a lot to catch up with the drivers ahead of me.”
A Saturday that compromised the whole weekend
Hamilton also believes that his difficulties originated from the free practice sessions.
During the third session, the Ferrari driver had hit the wall, an incident which, according to him, complicated the rest of his weekend.
“Without what happened on Saturday, we would have had a better qualifying and a much stronger race.”
Despite these many setbacks – collision with Russell, five-second penalty, aerodynamic damage, and incident during his pit stop – Hamilton believes he limited the damage with this fourth place, while remaining convinced that Ferrari had the means to fight for victory at Spa.
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