Not really. On just about every full throttle section hamilton is faster even at points when any such advantages should start to vein off. Verstappen simply carries more speed trough those last few corners (its there in the numbers) and then loses it down the straight because of combination of drag and/or engine performance. Exiting T10 for example Verstappen is even gaining on straight very early on (better exit) but still ends up losing this after a few seconds of full throttle.bonjon1979 wrote: ↑30 Nov 2021, 15:36Not really. Hamilton makes up so much on the final straight because he’s able to get on the power earlier in the corner and Carrie’s that speed with him
If anything the opposite is true about tyres. Hamilton makes up majority of his advantage in first half of the lap, around 0.38s up to T10, then till the end of the lap makes up only additional 0.05s, and all of this and more is made up on full throttle sections. So who's to say Verstappen's tyres didn't hold up better?
But actually I personally don't believe in this tyre nonsense on a single qualifying lap. Only in Barcelona it is perhaps feasible to save a bit early on to have some in reserve for final sector, but In Qatar we haven't heard any chatter about tyres falling off on a single lap, let alone saving them in S1/S2. Mercedes was just the better car in the end, tyres playing a role or not.