Mar.16 (GMM) Lewis Hamilton says he is back to his best after claiming P3 in China on Sunday, heading home teammate Charles Leclerc in a Ferrari battle that had team principal Fred Vasseur checking his pulse on the pitwall.
“I definitely feel like I’m back to my best,” the seven-time world champion said. “I still think there’s room to improve, but I’ve managed to pull these new tools together. Training this winter has been the heaviest and most intense I’ve ever had.”
Hamilton was also grateful to Ferrari for acting on the controversial technical feedback he had pushed hard for during a difficult debut season with the team last year.
“Digging deep with the engineers mid to end of last year, talking to them about things I wanted from the car – to see them listen and put some of those things on the car, I’m incredibly grateful,” he said.
“It just makes you feel more united with everyone because you’re moving in the same direction.”
“The Hamilton-Leclerc battle was the race’s defining spectacle – aggressive enough that George Russell admitted he was simply waiting for them to collide.
“I was just waiting for the two of them to collide and somehow they didn’t,” the Mercedes driver said. “It was some of the most aggressive racing I’ve seen for a while.”
Hamilton acknowledged one moment of contact. “There was one moment we did touch, but it was subtle – just a kiss, so it’s okay,” he smiled. “That’s what this is about. Tough racing.”
Vasseur, watching from the pitwall, was rather less relaxed. “I checked my pulse a couple of times,” the Frenchman admitted. “But it was fine.
“I trust our drivers – it wouldn’t have been easy to stop them, so we didn’t want to ask them to hold position. That would have been unfair.”
Sky Deutschland’s Ralf Schumacher was less convinced by the wisdom of the battle. “If you’re slower anyway, racing against each other doesn’t help,” he said. “You completely lose contact with the leader, wear out your tyres faster, and the data doesn’t improve either.”
Vasseur acknowledged the wider picture was bittersweet. “The positive is that we are number 2 out of 11 teams,” he said. “The negative is that we lost 25 seconds to the best Mercedes at the finish.”
Hamilton, however, found something to celebrate even in the regulations his rivals have been loudest in condemning. “It’s the best racing I’ve ever experienced in Formula 1,” he said.
“You can get very close – it felt like go-karting, back and forth. There was a thin piece of paper between us sometimes, but we didn’t exchange any paint.”
Audi team boss Jonathan Wheatley offered perhaps the bluntest summary of where Formula 1 stands after two rounds. “Mercedes and Ferrari have a usable package,” he said. “Everyone else is going through a difficult phase.”
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