Lewis Hamilton knew he faced a frustrating Azerbaijan Grand Prix once Mercedes decided to sacrifice his seventh place on the grid so he could take a fresh power unit.
But the team’s hopes he would be able to use that extra power to recover a decent points finish were dashed as Hamilton found it difficult to make any progress in the slipstream of his rivals.
Time and again Hamilton was unable to attack the car ahead of him as his rubber overheated, whether he was on the medium or hard compound. And just as he was starting to make progress in the final laps, the Virtual Safety Car was deployed and his last chances to make any moves disappeared.
Earlier in the race Mercedes predicted he should finish at least ninth, which he did. However he had been aided by the unexpected late retirements of two drivers ahead of him, so the result was clearly less than Mercedes had hoped for. This selection of his radio messages from Sunday’s race shows what went wrong.
Hamilton’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix radio messages
Jump to:
“Overtaking’s going to be difficult”
“This tyre is pretty bad”
“The rear’s just sliding around”
“This tyre’s so much better”
“Am I just slow?”
“Are you seeing how I have to drive this thing?”
“My tyres are ruined now”
“He’s backing me up”
“I’m not even going to say it”
“It was a horror race”
“Overtaking’s going to be difficult”
| Lap: 1/51 HAM: 2’05.704 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hamilton | Just bear in mind overtaking’s going to be difficult with anyone with fresh tyres than me. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hamilton | They’ve only just gone through turn one. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | Er, Leclerc at turn seven now. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | Okay Lewis so we’ll fire up. No need for a bite point find. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | And Leclerc at turn 17. And last car, Gasly, turn eight. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | So Leclerc just pulling up onto the grid. Gasly turn 17. So Ocon will be leaving his garage and joining us in pit lane. Ocon comes to a stop behind Hamilton’s car. |
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| Hamilton | Last car? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | Not yet. So mid-pack just did burn-outs. And last car approaching the grid. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bonnington | [Into] gear, good to go. And watch the lights. Hamilton pulls away |
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| Bonnington | So Zhou on hard tyre. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
“This tyre is pretty bad”
Hamilton picked off the two Sauber drivers quickly. Ahead of him Yuki Tsunoda dropped back through the field after picking up damage in a first-lap collision with Lance Stroll.
However Hamilton quickly discovered…
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