Lewis Hamilton says he hasn’t seen any improvement from his Mercedes over the first five races of the 2022 F1 season.
But team principal Toto Wolff believes they have now glimpsed a “sweet spot” in the car’s performance which they hope to exploit in coming races.
Hamilton finished sixth in Miami behind team mate George Russell. He lost 21 seconds to the leaders over the 13-lap green-flag run to the finish following a late Safety Car restart.
Speaking after the race, Hamilton said he’d seen no signs of a step forward by the team.
“Unfortunately not,” said Hamilton. “We’re the same speed as we were in the first race. So we’ve just got to keep trying.
“We haven’t improved, unfortunately, in these five races. I’m hopeful that at some stage we will. But we’ve just got to keep trying, keep working hard.”
The team has been plagued by problems with porpoising since the season began. Hamilton said that felt better during Sunday’s race, but pointed out it is highly sensitive to variations in track layout, surface and conditions.
“It wasn’t as bad today,” he said. “From race to race, track to track, surface to surface, how high we put the car – we can put the car higher and reduce it – so today wasn’t actually really bad, just not fast.”
Mercedes began the weekend more promisingly. Russell ended Friday’s disrupted practice sessions on top of the times sheets. However he said his car felt completely different by Saturday.
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Wolff said the team’s experience in Miami has “definitely given us answers” about the car.
“On the positive side, the car is quick when it’s in the sweet spot,” he said. “But understanding where the sweet spot is is something that we are going to become a step closer to after analysing all the data this weekend.”
He is unsure how soon that progress may translate into gains on-track. “Whether it’s Barcelona…