To describe Lewis Hamilton’s 2022 as the ‘worst’ season of his career, while statistically accurate, speaks volumes of the immense success he has enjoyed through his 16-year stint in Formula 1.
No poles. No wins. He finished outside the top five in the championship for the first time in his career – something he managed to achieve even during his most challenging season at McLaren in 2011.
Yet, he still scored nine podiums and was in the hunt for wins a handful of times during the end of the year in a car that only won once all season – a reflection that the 38-year-old seven-times champion is still the Lewis Hamilton he’s always been known to be. So heading into a fresh start in 2023, how is he feeling about the new season and a chance to pursue a record-breaking eighth world title once again?
“I wouldn’t say I’m bullish like I was last year, I would say just more cautious,” Hamilton told media including RaceFans after Mercedes’ W14 was unveiled for the first time.
“Hopefully we hit the ground running, but it’s not always the case. I think we showed last year that whatever we’re faced with, we can recover. So that’s what we’ll try to do this year.”
After eight consecutive constructors’ titles and Hamilton winning six of the last eight drivers’ championships, Mercedes could have easily swallowed their 2022 as an inevitability, the ending of an unparalleled run of success that was always certain to end eventually. But that is not the Brackley mentality. Team principal Toto Wolff openly admitted his team’s performance in 2022 was unacceptable to the entire team as well as him. So now, no solution has been overlooked, no avenue unexplored in Mercedes’ pursuit of returning to the top and avoiding another humbling year like they just endured.
“I think ultimately – and it applies to everything in life and every genre job through difficult times – through failure is where you gain the most strength,” Hamilton explains. “It’s when you have to analyse and be critical of yourself and that’s for sure the time that you grow stronger.
“Last year was a year of strengthening for us, even though from the outside it was not a great year for us. But I think as a time we all had to dig deeper – if you look at just everyone showing their vulnerable side, everyone having to deal with the failure in their own way, but…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at RaceFans…