“We can’t forever reply on reliability”: Lewis Hamilton urges Mercedes to up their game to keep up with Ferrari and Red Bull

“We can’t forever reply on reliability”: Lewis Hamilton urges Mercedes to up their game to keep up with Ferrari and Red Bull

Lewis Hamilton

As one of the foremost teams in the Formula 1 grid, with a record of winning eight consecutive Constructors’ Championship titles, Mercedes performed below everyone’s expectations in the first few races of the 2022 F1 season. But now that thirteen races have already taken place and this year’s F1 calendar is left with only nine more Grands Prix, the Stuttgart-based team has managed to stay atop most of its competitors and is even putting up a great fight with Ferrari for the second spot by relying exclusively on its almost-flawless reliability.

The Mercedes W13 is nowhere near the cars that its rival teams, Red Bull and Ferrari, have produced for this season, in terms of race pace and performance. The car could not even crack the code for protection against porpoising, which caused Lewis Hamilton immense back pain from all the bouncing, during the Azerbaijan GP in Baku. But one thing that Mercedes have always had going for them even when Red Bull drivers were DNF-ing their races and Ferrari was losing out on points due to engine problems, is—reliability.

But Lewis Hamilton has now shot off a warning to his team that they will not get far in this season by simply hoping one of the top two teams witness reliability issues and then Mercedes would take their place. They need to work on their pace and perform well to earn a podium spot in the last nine races of the season.

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Lewis Hamilton believes Mercedes have work to do on their car, cannot simply rely on reliability

Lewis Hamilton
Lewis Hamilton

37-year-old F1 veteran Lewis Hamilton has spent decades behind the wheels of the F1 racecars and he knows a winning team when he sees it. Right now, even though Mercedes have made up spots and cemented their position in the top 3 in the Constructors’ Championship table, the Stuttgart-based manufacturer is still relying heavily on reliability being their sole strength. But Formula 1 is a sport of race pace and car performance, both of which are lacking in the Mercedes W13.

Hence, the seven-time World Champion believes Mercedes need to work extensively.on their car to be able to put up great performances in the nine remaining races of this season. If the team manages to crack the formula to increase their car’s race pace, Lewis believes they will hopefully capture the second spot in the Constructors’ Championship.

Speaking of his evaluation of Mercedes’ performance in this season so that, he said, “We’ve had some really nice consistency in these last few races, which has been great.”

Then he continued, “We’re still lacking performance, which is a difficult thing because I think there’s potential in this car, but we’ve had to depower it to stop it from bouncing. We’ve had really good reliability, but we can’t forever rely on reliability being the thing that keeps us on the podium, so we really need performance.”