What Hamilton must do to turn title race his way
His sensational drive in the US Grand Prix, the Briton finds himself 12 points behind fierce rival and under pressure
hdespite Get the team around him
It will take a huge team effort if Lewis Hamilton is to get out of this and he must get everyone – on both sides of the Mercedes garage – pulling for him. Whatever it takes; pizzas for the boys, Churchillian speeches on the shop floor in Brackley, burning the midnight oil himself if required. Hamilton must set the tone. Any update, any extra bit of lap time, could make the difference.
Drive the wheels off it
Hamilton found himself behind the eight ball on Sunday after being pipped to pole by Max Verstappen; exposed on the grid, the filling in a Red Bull sandwich with team-mate Valtteri Bottas ninth. But a brilliant start nearly got the seven-time world champion out of jail, forcing Red Bull into an “aggressive” undercut strategy which almost allowed Hamilton in at the end. For as long as Mercedes remain fractionally slower than the Red Bull, Hamilton must remain razor sharp to extract the maximum possible.
Rattle Verstappen
While he is generally clean and fair on track, it is not unheard of for Hamilton to resort to a few mind games or spoiling tactics, as he showed with team-mates Fernando Alonso in 2007 and Nico Rosberg in 2015. Jenson Button suggested Hamilton may even have been trying a bit of that in qualifying on Saturday when he moved up alongside Verstappen on track, eliciting Verstappen’s “stupid idiot” jibe. It will be interesting to see whether Hamilton adopts a more aggressive attitude in the remaining races, or tries to get under the Dutchman’s skin in any way.
Keep it clean on track
While he wants to push Verstappen hard, Hamilton cannot afford DNFS or mistakes himself. The 36-yearold must heed the famous maxim that “to finish first, first you have to finish”. As long as he keeps finishing at least second to Verstappen he cannot lose too much ground. That means no contact on the track.
Get Bottas going
Bottas’s contributions to the Mercedes cause in Austin were limited due to the Finn taking his sixth engine of the season in Texas. But he can still play a crucial part in this title race. Bottas performed a valuable role for Hamilton in Istanbul where he won the race, limiting the Briton’s losses after the seven-time world champion took a grid penalty of his own. And Mercedes badly need Bottas to roll up his sleeves and get stuck in by outqualifying the Red Bulls if he can, spoiling their races, acting as a rear gunner for his team-mate.
Be patient
There is still plenty of time. It may feel as if Red Bull have all the momentum, coming off an excellent weekend and with a couple of circuits coming up where they are expected to dominate. But Mercedes were expected to dominate in Austin and look what happened. The reality is 12 points is nothing – one mistake, one DNF and that lead is wiped out.
There are still 125 points up for grabs and anything can happen, as Hamilton acknowledged on Sunday. “We have no idea [what will happen],” he said. “Mexico and Brazil are two circuits that are strong for Red Bull so we just try to minimise how strong they can be compared to us and see if we can do a better job.”
Even if Red Bull do fly at altitude, the final three circuits should offer opportunities. Qatar and Saudi Arabia are unknowns but the latter in particular looks as if it should be good for Mercedes with its long drags, while Hamilton has won four of the past seven races in Abu Dhabi. Verstappen was victorious at Yas Marina 12 months ago, Hamilton was recovering from Covid-19 at the time.
“I’m not thinking about it at the moment,” concluded Hamilton on Sunday. “I’ve got to be happy with the job I did today. Unfortunately we weren’t quick enough to win the race but, yeah, we just look forward and take it one race at a time.”