Mercedes F1 car improvements offer Hamilton “glimpse of hope”

Mercedes brought a raft of updates for the W13 car to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya for this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix in the hope of easing the porpoising problem that has blighted Hamilton and team-mate George Russell this year.

Mercedes showed signs of improving its relative pace to Red Bull and Ferrari through practice, and briefly led the timesheets in Q2 as its rivals opted to complete their first runs on used tyres.

Russell qualified fourth, beating Sergio Perez in the Red Bull, while Hamilton ended the session sixth, 0.762s off Charles Leclerc’s pole position time.

Although Hamilton noted after qualifying that he was “in the same position I was in the last race”, he was upbeat about the progress Mercedes had made to ease the porpoising problem.

“We don’t have the bouncing in a straight line, which is a huge, huge difference,” Hamilton said.

“But we still have some bouncing in like Turn 3 and Turn 9. So we still have some improvements to make, but the car’s a lot better.”

Hamilton added: “You see in Q2, we were quickest. So that’s a glimpse of hope for the team.”

Hamilton sits sixth in the drivers’ championship after five races, running a distant 68 points off leader Leclerc to leave any hope of fighting for a record-breaking eighth world title this year in serious doubt.

Asked if the step forward in Barcelona gave him a bit of hope that he might get himself back into contention for the title this year, Hamilton replied: “I’m not really putting my mind to that, I’m still way off.

“My team-mate’s fourth, so that means the car should be at least third or fourth, and I’m sixth. So I’m still struggling with the car.

“I don’t know how to get around that, I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I’ll just continue to try and work hard on myself.”

Russell agreed with Hamilton’s assessment that porpoising remained an issue going…