Lewis Hamilton believes aero problems with new Mercedes upgrades brought to the US Grand Prix could be to blame for his early race exit.
The seven-time world champion weathered a difficult Austin event by becoming the first and only race retirement after spinning into the gravel trap at Turn 19 on lap three.
With teammate George Russell having suffered a similar spin in qualifying and Hamilton himself having had another mystery gone in practice, he suspects that bounce caused by a new W15 upgrade may be the cause of all the team’s problems.
Reflecting on his spin in the race, Hamilton told Motorsport.com: “I had a great start, felt good and got up to 12th. It was the best start I’ve had on the first lap for a long time.
“I wasn’t even pushing at the time; I was literally just trying to get going and get the tires up to temperature.
“The car started to bounce, the left front started to bounce and the rear just came around. It was the same as George yesterday.”
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes-AMG F1 Team, gets a trip back to the pits after spinning out and retiring from the race
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Reflecting on the coincidence between him and Russell suffering almost identical incidents, Hamilton reckoned the team needed to look at the impact of the new package it brought here.
“In P1 I had the same thing,” he said. “I had a spin in Turn 3, which is so rare. I’ve never spun in Turn 3 in all the years I’ve been here.
“I was just saying George obviously had the same problem yesterday, he’s gone back to the old car and looks good out there so maybe there’s something to the new upgrade.”
Asked if the problems opened up the possibility of Mercedes returning to its old specification for next weekend’s Mexican Grand Prix, Hamilton said: “We will investigate as much as we can and after today we will get the data and see if we will be on the old or the new spec next week.”
Hamilton endured a rollercoaster of a weekend in Austin, with the Mercedes car’s swerving shape once again confusing drivers and team.
After eyeing pole position in the sprint race on Friday before a yellow flag derailed his efforts, his hopes of a good recovery in Saturday’s rally were dashed by a suspension problem early on.
Later in the day, he suffered a nightmare in the main qualifying session, failing to make it out of Q1 and finishing 19th fastest.
After starting 17th on the grid, thanks to teammate George Russell starting from the pit lane and Liam Lawson’s grid penalty, he started brilliantly to finish the opening lap in 12th before his spin.
Hamilton figured that with the way the car was behaving, the likelihood was that he would always end the race with an incident.
“If I didn’t have the bouncing stuff on that lap, I think it would have happened on a later lap because something wasn’t quite right there with the car,” he said.
“It’s been the same for most of the weekend with this new package we’ve got, so of course it was devastating. But it is what it is.”