Damon Hill pinpoints glaring flaw in Lewis Hamilton’s skill-set after F1 Dutch Grand Prix
The Mercedes driver endured a disappointing weekend at the F1 Dutch Gra𝓰nd Prix, qualifying in 13th then finishing the race sixth.
Hamilto🔯n insisted “the team’s call” to use slick tyres, in contrast to m♔ost of the grid, cost him a possible victory.
But ex-F1 driver Hill told Sky afterwar൩ds: “It seems to me that when all the confusion is out of the way, and he just gets on with driving, then he’s the fastest driver.
“But when there are lots of decisions to make, and there’s a bitꦚ of confusion ꦦbetween what the team wants and what he wants, then it makes him a little bit hesitant.”
George Russ🌜ell also vented his anger via Mercedes’ team radio after slipping to 18th when he pitted,𓆏 after his tyre strategy also backfired.
Hill said: “It was raining quickly and very hard.
“Thꦕe driver also has a responsibility🎀 to give a clue about what’s going on.
“You can see, when you go aro✱und, you should’ve been able📖 to see that there was rain coming.
“It may have been possible to say: Listen, I’m c🍃oming in, we’re not going to get it round another lap’💧.
“And so there is ওsome reဣsponsibility on the driver.
“I had a race at Doninꩵgton where it was raining, drizzling, dry, drizzling - Aryton Senna famously won it by a country mile because he stayed out on one set of tyres!
“You’re only ever a 👍fraction ♚of a second from getting it right. And who can predict the weather?”
Sky’s Bernie Collins, who is th ex-🐭strategy engineer for Asဣton Martin, said about Mercedes: “They clearly went into the race with the mindset that it wasn’t going to rain, or it wouldn’t be for long.
“Because Lewi🤪s was the only car to start on that medium tyre.
“Everyone else had perhaps🤡 an inkling that the soft was better for the firstཧ few laps until the rain came.
“They were the only team to diverge from that.
“There was a lot ꧋of hope on drive♛r radios that it was survivable, they would get through the rain, it didn’t need an inter tyre.
“But you need to react to the p𝐆ace that someone li꧙ke Max or Checo showed on that inter, how quick they were on it.”
James was a sports jour🌼nalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to f✅ootball, to F1.
