{"id":18125,"date":"2025-04-14T02:41:10","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T02:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/18125\/"},"modified":"2025-04-14T02:41:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T02:41:10","slug":"hamilton-handed-damning-is-he-back-at-mercedes-verdict","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/18125\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamilton handed damning &#8216;Is he back at Mercedes?&#8217; verdict"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Lewis Hamilton has been likened to the dejected character who played out his final season at Mercedes last year following his post-qualifying comments for the Bahrain Grand Prix.<\/p>\n<p>Hamilton struggled for pace and performance in his Ferrari around the Bahrain International Circuit, qualifying a lowly ninth, and finishing a staggering six-tenths of a second adrift of Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc.<\/p>\n<p>That was despite the addition of a new floor on the car that in the hands of the Mon\u00e9gasque propelled him to third at the end of the session ahead of a promotion to second on the grid for the start <a href=\"https:\/\/racingnews365.com\/mercedes-drivers-hit-with-surprise-grid-penalties-after-bahrain-error\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">following a one-place grid penalty for Mercedes&#8217; George Russell<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In the written media pen after qualifying, Hamilton cut a disconsolate figure, with his answers to questions barely audible.<\/p>\n<p>That left former F1 driver and Sky Sports F1 pundit Karun Chandhok believing the clock had been turned back to last year when Hamilton seemed equally as lost on occasion<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I heard his comments and he sounded completely like he was on the floor,&#8221; said Chandhok. &#8220;If I closed my eyes, it was like him wearing the Mercedes uniform last year.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Didn&#8217;t it just sound like him last year? How many times last year did we hear him say, &#8216;I can&#8217;t qualify&#8217;?<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I just closed my eyes and thought, &#8216;Is he in a Mercedes race suit again?&#8217; It just felt like last year again. I don&#8217;t know what&#8217;s happened.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Hamilton turned 40 earlier this year, and there may be a suggestion that time has caught up with him, although he did qualify on pole for the sprint in China just three weeks ago, going on to clinch victory.<\/p>\n<p>As to whether Hamilton&#8217;s age has to be taken into consideration for his qualifying performance, Chandhok replied: &#8220;With age, the thing that you lose is the ultimate speed in qualifying, but six-tenths to Leclerc, it was a lot.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lewis Hamilton has been likened to the dejected character who played out his final season at Mercedes last&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18126,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[748,859,393,1076,1074,1077,1075,997,707,4884,998,1073,1072,12,1144,1071,712,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-18125","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-daniel-ricciardo","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-f1-calendar","12":"tag-f1-live","13":"tag-f1-results","14":"tag-f1-standings","15":"tag-ferrari","16":"tag-formula-1","17":"tag-great-britain","18":"tag-lewis-hamilton","19":"tag-max-verstappen","20":"tag-motorsport","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-northern-ireland","23":"tag-racing","24":"tag-scotland","25":"tag-uk","26":"tag-united-kingdom","27":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114334012896575216","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18125\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}