What really fuelled Hamilton’s ‘I’m not fast anymore’ remark

Lewis Hamilton became the most successful Formula 1 driver in history because of a complete belief in his own abilities.

This conviction is something I’ve seen him carry from the moment I first met him at his house in Stevenage more than 25 years ago, when he was just a young karter setting his sights on making it all the way to the top.

So Hamilton’s remarks in Qatar last weekend, amid another difficult weekend, that he was “not fast anymore” certainly seemed to go against the grain of all that we know Hamilton to be.

But do not think for one second that Hamilton thinks he is past it and no longer capable of delivering any more on track. That much was made clear 24 hours later when he declared that he knew he “has still got it”.

Instead, Hamilton’s remarks have to be seen in the context of what has perhaps been the most mentally challenging season of his career.

Results have been hard to get, he has faced a car that he does not particularly get on well with, and this is all against the backdrop of being in a complicated scenario where he is operating within a team that he is leaving.

And what has perhaps made things most difficult is that there has been no obvious explanation as to why he has struggled so much with the W15 compared to team-mate George Russell, especially on Saturdays. It fuels the question: is it the car or is it him?

From the outside it has been hard enough to understand just how Hamilton can go from being lost at sea in the Brazilian Grand Prix, for example, to being in blistering form at the Las Vegas GP the following race, charging up from 10th on the grid to finish second.

But even the man in the cockpit cannot get to the bottom of what is happening.

Asked last weekend in Qatar about what his best explanation for it was, Hamilton said: “I don’t even know where to start. It’s different every weekend.

“There’s nothing I can say that’s going to make any difference. Stuff that we’re working on in the background.

“The working window that you have with a car, some people have a bigger working window, some have a narrower working window in terms of the aero package. There’s the tyres.

“If you look at the last race [in Las Vegas], why were we so fast? Because we could get the tyres in the window and others struggled. Everyone’s facing something different.

“I know what we’re working on with our…