2022 Mercedes-AMG | Petronas F1 Team

[DGP123]

George single handed-ly got the team a podium by making the right call for the tyres.

Think this point gets overplayed. Yes, he made the call, but in the bigger picture, was again being outperformed, and reliant upon outside intervention, in order to compete with Hamilton on his clean weekends. Without the safety car at Zandvoort, Russell was anonymous, and Hamilton was the lead car and likely finishing second anyway.

Not entirely sure Lewis is worried about George at all. Once the Mercedes becomes more competitive, hopefully next season, then I fully expect that Lewis will come alive. Lewis has quite clearly shown no sign of decline, in race pace, or qualifying performance. Bad luck and experimentation around porposing has hindered him this season, which has ultimately played into Russell’s hands.

[tpe]

The re not the only ones you know

[Zynerji]

It's not as if George is barely keeping up with some extra luck, he's 35 points ahead, which is far from insignificant. Both drivers have had perfect reliability, with a large chunk of Lewis' problems having been self-inflicted. Like Spa, which then snowballed into Monza.

There have been some safety car lottery wins for George earlier in the season. That Lewis was also hampered by running the experimental stuff meant he was out of position early season too. Since they stopped doing that, Lewis has out qualified George and, before Spa, was out resulting him too.

He was done by George changing strategy on him towards the end of the Dutch GP too. Interestingly, that wouldn't have happened in previous seasons because Lewis would have been ahead of Bottas, so it's another indication that Lewis doesn't get the preferential treatment that some people say he gets. I thought it a little harsh on him because he did the ball-ache stuff early in the season which George benefitted from, and it was a bit of a stab in the back. Certainly, Lewis wasn't impressed.

Spa was a simple mistake from Lewis and he did put his hands up to that. Monza was a double punishment for Spa, of course, but also showed that he's still got the drive in him as he fought back to 5th, only two places behind he team mate who, of course, finished lower than he started the race. Without the Spa moment, Lewis would have likely finished ahead of George in Spa and Monza based on the pace they showed during the weekends.

Looking at the actual situations rather than the headlines always highlights the reality.

Wait a minute. Aren't you the one that continuously slakes Vettel because Ricciardo outscored him in 2014, but now are doing backflips to protect Hamilton when he's being crushed by George in points? Sketchy, very sketchy...

[CHT]

Alonso doesn't seem to struggle. I wouldn't expect Hamilton to either. Age is only a number. Michael would have won 2007 and 2008 if they didn't sack him.

To struggle is one thing, to not be at the top is another. I don't think Fernando could compete against someone like Max at this age. I mean, he's not exactly knocking Ocon out of the park who is not even considered a top talent currently.

Similarly George (who is a top talent) is giving Lewis a massive challenge. So you have that challenge within the team and then you have the much greater challenge still of beating Verstappen for the championship. And then you have Ferrari lurking in the wings, taking wins and podiums, complicating the picture. Lewis won't struggle (I think), but the route to another championship is becoming increasingly complex.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't see George as giving Lewis a "massive" challenge. George is a brilliant driver and a stark contrast to his predecessor but I do think George has had the lion's share of good fortune this year, particularly in the races which is reflected in him having more points than Lewis so far. Lewis has also sacrificed his car for experimenting and testing during quali and the races for the first half of the season which when he stopped doing, he immediately out-qualified George consistently and has generally been ahead in the races. So whilst George is a more challenging teammate than Bottas was, I don't think he is actually giving Lewis much to worry about. I genuinely think, looking at Lewis's demeanour, he isn't concerned about George at all.

George is a bit of an uncut diamond at the moment, I think as he develops and matures, we will see him as a worthy successor to Lewis when he eventually calls it a day but is he currently as good a driver as Lewis? Definitely not imo.

To be fair, unlike Lewis, George has never driven a car that is capable of challenging for poles or wins in his F1 career yet. And yet, he has already bagged one pole in 2022 due to unique circumstances. Looking back I think 2022 may possibly be the worst ever F1 season for LH, where he will have no pole, no win and possibly finishing the season behind his teammate.

I think George is still relatively young as a driver and this is still his first season driving for a top team. As a young teammate to 7x WDC, he still learning and will only get faster. If he can finish the season ahead of LH that will be a big motivation factor for 2023 which may actually be a problem for LH because is not used to having teammate that challenge him for point and position.

From Merc perspective, I reckon they must have already started to plan for the future without LH as I dont think LH will hang around too long if he is not given a car that is capable of challenging for WDC.

[Hammerfist]

To struggle is one thing, to not be at the top is another. I don't think Fernando could compete against someone like Max at this age. I mean, he's not exactly knocking Ocon out of the park who is not even considered a top talent currently.

Similarly George (who is a top talent) is giving Lewis a massive challenge. So you have that challenge within the team and then you have the much greater challenge still of beating Verstappen for the championship. And then you have Ferrari lurking in the wings, taking wins and podiums, complicating the picture. Lewis won't struggle (I think), but the route to another championship is becoming increasingly complex.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't see George as giving Lewis a "massive" challenge. George is a brilliant driver and a stark contrast to his predecessor but I do think George has had the lion's share of good fortune this year, particularly in the races which is reflected in him having more points than Lewis so far. Lewis has also sacrificed his car for experimenting and testing during quali and the races for the first half of the season which when he stopped doing, he immediately out-qualified George consistently and has generally been ahead in the races. So whilst George is a more challenging teammate than Bottas was, I don't think he is actually giving Lewis much to worry about. I genuinely think, looking at Lewis's demeanour, he isn't concerned about George at all.

George is a bit of an uncut diamond at the moment, I think as he develops and matures, we will see him as a worthy successor to Lewis when he eventually calls it a day but is he currently as good a driver as Lewis? Definitely not imo.

To be fair, unlike Lewis, George has never driven a car that is capable of challenging for poles or wins in his F1 career yet. And yet, he has already bagged one pole in 2022 due to unique circumstances. Looking back I think 2022 may possibly be the worst ever F1 season for LH, where he will have no pole, no win and possibly finishing the season behind his teammate.

I think George is still relatively young as a driver and this is still his first season driving for a top team. As a young teammate to 7x WDC, he still learning and will only get faster. If he can finish the season ahead of LH that will be a big motivation factor for 2023 which may actually be a problem for LH because is not used to having teammate that challenge him for point and position.

From Merc perspective, I reckon they must have already started to plan for the future without LH as I dont think LH will hang around too long if he is not given a car that is capable of challenging for WDC.

Last year carlos sainz outscored leclerc but if you paid attention leclerc was still the faster driver. Now in a championship level car he has destroyed sainz even though the points have been close.

I highly doubt Hamilton is worried about george tbh. He is faster than him in quali and race ever since they stopped the experiments. And i suspect we havent even seen lewis beast mode yet. Whenever his back is against the wall that is when he usually raises his level to ridiculous heights. Verstappen found that out late last year. Vettel found that out in 17’and 18’. Russell will find out sooner or later what its like to go against that.

[CHT]

Maybe it's just me, but I don't see George as giving Lewis a "massive" challenge. George is a brilliant driver and a stark contrast to his predecessor but I do think George has had the lion's share of good fortune this year, particularly in the races which is reflected in him having more points than Lewis so far. Lewis has also sacrificed his car for experimenting and testing during quali and the races for the first half of the season which when he stopped doing, he immediately out-qualified George consistently and has generally been ahead in the races. So whilst George is a more challenging teammate than Bottas was, I don't think he is actually giving Lewis much to worry about. I genuinely think, looking at Lewis's demeanour, he isn't concerned about George at all.

George is a bit of an uncut diamond at the moment, I think as he develops and matures, we will see him as a worthy successor to Lewis when he eventually calls it a day but is he currently as good a driver as Lewis? Definitely not imo.

To be fair, unlike Lewis, George has never driven a car that is capable of challenging for poles or wins in his F1 career yet. And yet, he has already bagged one pole in 2022 due to unique circumstances. Looking back I think 2022 may possibly be the worst ever F1 season for LH, where he will have no pole, no win and possibly finishing the season behind his teammate.

I think George is still relatively young as a driver and this is still his first season driving for a top team. As a young teammate to 7x WDC, he still learning and will only get faster. If he can finish the season ahead of LH that will be a big motivation factor for 2023 which may actually be a problem for LH because is not used to having teammate that challenge him for point and position.

From Merc perspective, I reckon they must have already started to plan for the future without LH as I dont think LH will hang around too long if he is not given a car that is capable of challenging for WDC.

Last year carlos sainz outscored leclerc but if you paid attention leclerc was still the faster driver. Now in a championship level car he has destroyed sainz even though the points have been close.

I highly doubt Hamilton is worried about george tbh. He is faster than him in quali and race ever since they stopped the experiments. And i suspect we havent even seen lewis beast mode yet. Whenever his back is against the wall that is when he usually raises his level to ridiculous heights. Verstappen found that out late last year. Vettel found that out in 17’and 18’. Russell will find out sooner or later what its like to go against that.

The LH which we know this far is an F1 driver who has been driving the best car on the grid for the past 6 to 7 years. This is somewhat similar to the period when MS was dominating F1 with Ferrari, or SV with RBR.

When a driver is driving the best car, its easy to talk about beast mode and hammertime. Just like current Max, who can start practically start from almost any position and win the race.

When Lorenzo join Valetino Rossi at Yamaha, everyone was expecting Lorenzo to fair poorly against the 7xWC. However it only took Lorenzo 2 seasons to beat Rossi and win the championship. Hence let's not write off George Russell because this is only his 1st season driving for top team. Whereas LH has been driving for top teams throughout his F1 career.

[Stu]

This thread has become solely about the drivers, please try to keep it focused on the team.

It is not just this thread, other team threads have had too much intra-team bickering.

This is a TECHNICAL FORUM and driver nonsense is not only veering off topic it is edging towards OFF FORUM!

[Just_a_fan]

It's not as if George is barely keeping up with some extra luck, he's 35 points ahead, which is far from insignificant. Both drivers have had perfect reliability, with a large chunk of Lewis' problems having been self-inflicted. Like Spa, which then snowballed into Monza.

There have been some safety car lottery wins for George earlier in the season. That Lewis was also hampered by running the experimental stuff meant he was out of position early season too. Since they stopped doing that, Lewis has out qualified George and, before Spa, was out resulting him too.

He was done by George changing strategy on him towards the end of the Dutch GP too. Interestingly, that wouldn't have happened in previous seasons because Lewis would have been ahead of Bottas, so it's another indication that Lewis doesn't get the preferential treatment that some people say he gets. I thought it a little harsh on him because he did the ball-ache stuff early in the season which George benefitted from, and it was a bit of a stab in the back. Certainly, Lewis wasn't impressed.

Spa was a simple mistake from Lewis and he did put his hands up to that. Monza was a double punishment for Spa, of course, but also showed that he's still got the drive in him as he fought back to 5th, only two places behind he team mate who, of course, finished lower than he started the race. Without the Spa moment, Lewis would have likely finished ahead of George in Spa and Monza based on the pace they showed during the weekends.

Looking at the actual situations rather than the headlines always highlights the reality.

Wait a minute. Aren't you the one that continuously slakes Vettel because Ricciardo outscored him in 2014, but now are doing backflips to protect Hamilton when he's being crushed by George in points? Sketchy, very sketchy...

Er, no, that's not me.

[Just_a_fan]

This thread has become solely about the drivers, please try to keep it focused on the team.

It is not just this thread, other team threads have had too much intra-team bickering.

This is a TECHNICAL FORUM and driver nonsense is not only veering off topic it is edging towards OFF FORUM!

The drivers are part of the team so discussing the drivers is not off topic.

Information about the team is not technical anyway, so any team topic is already off topic in terms of the forum's supposed raison d'être.

Discussing teams and drivers in other, unrelated, topics is off topic as you suggest.

[chrisc90]

George single handed-ly got the team a podium by making the right call for the tyres. As I’ve said before, Mercedes’ are clueless in situations like that for choosing the faster tyre for a few laps but would rather stay on a slower tyre and hope the car behind doing quali laps at the end isn’t able to overtake. They just constantly think it’s a 1 car width wide track like Monaco and others are unable to overtake. Basic errors.

You seem to be more in the Mercedes thread than the Redbull thread! A big Lewis fan? Certainly not George. You weren't in the Williams thread last year...

What's wrong with that? Seems some Mercedes fans cant handle the truth at times (not you specifically)

[chrisc90]

Your veiled attempts at trolling has long gotten tiresome.

Whats wrong about what I said? Speaking facts isnt trolling. If George stayed on the older slower tyres, he would have for sure lost out to cars behind him.

[PlatinumZealot]

Your veiled attempts at trolling has long gotten tiresome.

Whats wrong about what I said? Speaking facts isnt trolling. If George stayed on the older slower tyres, he would have for sure lost out to cars behind him.

Facts?

[AMG.Tzan]

Your veiled attempts at trolling has long gotten tiresome.

Whats wrong about what I said? Speaking facts isnt trolling. If George stayed on the older slower tyres, he would have for sure lost out to cars behind him.

It should have been a team effort to keep both George and Lewis out so that they work together to keep the team 1-2!

Yet Russell only thought of himself and I still don’t understand why the team let him pit! Even Lewis on the radio instantly realized why it was wrong to pit only Russell!

Although it got him a P2 at the end, had he defended Verstapen for some laps he would have helped Hamilton bring his tires up to temperature and at least defend from Leclerc at the end!

For me there was another master stroke they could have pulled! Had they told Russel to slow down a bit when he passed Verstapen under the SC before entering the pits they could have pitted Lewis and got him back ahead into P1. I know there’s the 10 car lengths rule but who knows…they may had been able to pull it off! Worst case scenario…Lewis would have ended up 3rd with new tires behind Verstapen before the SC restart!

[chrisc90]

Your veiled attempts at trolling has long gotten tiresome.

Whats wrong about what I said? Speaking facts isnt trolling. If George stayed on the older slower tyres, he would have for sure lost out to cars behind him.

It should have been a team effort to keep both George and Lewis out so that they work together to keep the team 1-2!

Yet Russell only thought of himself and I still don’t understand why the team let him pit! Even Lewis on the radio instantly realized why it was wrong to pit only Russell!

Although it got him a P2 at the end, had he defended Verstapen for some laps he would have helped Hamilton bring his tires up to temperature and at least defend from Leclerc at the end!

For me there was another master stroke they could have pulled! Had they told Russel to slow down a bit when he passed Verstapen under the SC before entering the pits they could have pitted Lewis and got him back ahead into P1. I know there’s the 10 car lengths rule but who knows…they may had been able to pull it off! Worst case scenario…Lewis would have ended up 3rd with new tires behind Verstapen before the SC restart!

Only problem is Max would have been past Russell the same way he got past Lewis. It would have been better to bring a car home in P2 and P4 than P3 and P4 if Russell was on the slower tyre. There was NOTHING stopping Lewis from making the same call as George to pit for the softer tyre.

The slowing down is relatively plausible, but I wonder how quick Max would have caught up. Timing/lap data had Lewis 1.741 seconds SLOWER than Max on the first green flag lap (lap 61) Russell was only 0.2seconds faster on the soft tyre. After that you have Russell who was about 0.2seconds slower than Max each lap whilst Lewis was +0.4 (lap 62), +0.752(lap 63), +1.733(lap 64), +1.238(lap 65), +2.1(lap 66), Then he is about +0.7-0.9 the remaining laps.

Would George have suffered the same times as Lewis on the medium tyre? More than likely, since Lewis typically has better or equal race pace to George(going by what everyone says on here).

Thats not to bring in Charles aswell.

I think it is safe to say, that the fact that Russell was on average over a second faster than Lewis on a soft vs Medium, he managed to keep his 2nd place by doing the switch onto the faster tyre, which also warms up faster. Medium looks to take another 4 laps to get some decent pace back in it.

All you have to do is look at Ferrari and their decision with Charles at Silverstone, That's exactly what happened to Lewis because the team favoured track position.

Edit: From watching Lewis onboard on F1TV, he was annoyed because George was the 'buffer' between Lewis and Max in P3, when George pitted they lost the 'buffer'....Was Lewis only thinking about himself there?

As Tzan said, the best option would have been to slow George to the 10 car lengths and get Lewis pitted in that time, but instead they only think about track position. Latifi was probably between 2 and 3 car lengths to Lewis so George could have slowed down to the 10, and made it 13-14car lengths if you include Latifi's car physically.

Russell entered the Merc pit box 3-4seconds after Lewis passes it, so had he dropped back, there would have been ample time to get lewis out ahead of George.

1:27.07 on F1TV Ham onboard Lewis even admits its going to be hard to keep Max behind him on the newer tyre. Im not sure what more defending one can realistically give.

[AMG.Tzan]

Whats wrong about what I said? Speaking facts isnt trolling. If George stayed on the older slower tyres, he would have for sure lost out to cars behind him.

It should have been a team effort to keep both George and Lewis out so that they work together to keep the team 1-2!

Yet Russell only thought of himself and I still don’t understand why the team let him pit! Even Lewis on the radio instantly realized why it was wrong to pit only Russell!

Although it got him a P2 at the end, had he defended Verstapen for some laps he would have helped Hamilton bring his tires up to temperature and at least defend from Leclerc at the end!

For me there was another master stroke they could have pulled! Had they told Russel to slow down a bit when he passed Verstapen under the SC before entering the pits they could have pitted Lewis and got him back ahead into P1. I know there’s the 10 car lengths rule but who knows…they may had been able to pull it off! Worst case scenario…Lewis would have ended up 3rd with new tires behind Verstapen before the SC restart!

Only problem is Max would have been past Russell the same way he got past Lewis. It would have been better to bring a car home in P2 and P4 than P3 and P4 if Russell was on the slower tyre. There was NOTHING stopping Lewis from making the same call as George to pit for the softer tyre.

The slowing down is relatively plausible, but I wonder how quick Max would have caught up. Timing/lap data had Lewis 1.741 seconds SLOWER than Max on the first green flag lap (lap 61) Russell was only 0.2seconds faster on the soft tyre. After that you have Russell who was about 0.2seconds slower than Max each lap whilst Lewis was +0.4 (lap 62), +0.752(lap 63), +1.733(lap 64), +1.238(lap 65), +2.1(lap 66), Then he is about +0.7-0.9 the remaining laps.

Would George have suffered the same times as Lewis on the medium tyre? More than likely, since Lewis typically has better or equal race pace to George(going by what everyone says on here).

Thats not to bring in Charles aswell.

I think it is safe to say, that the fact that Russell was on average over a second faster than Lewis on a soft vs Medium, he managed to keep his 2nd place by doing the switch onto the faster tyre, which also warms up faster. Medium looks to take another 4 laps to get some decent pace back in it.

All you have to do is look at Ferrari and their decision with Charles at Silverstone, That's exactly what happened to Lewis because the team favoured track position.

Edit: From watching Lewis onboard on F1TV, he was annoyed because George was the 'buffer' between Lewis and Max in P3, when George pitted they lost the 'buffer'....Was Lewis only thinking about himself there?

As Tzan said, the best option would have been to slow George to the 10 car lengths and get Lewis pitted in that time, but instead they only think about track position. Latifi was probably between 2 and 3 car lengths to Lewis so George could have slowed down to the 10, and made it 13-14car lengths if you include Latifi's car physically.

Russell entered the Merc pit box 3-4seconds after Lewis passes it, so had he dropped back, there would have been ample time to get lewis out ahead of George.

1:27.07 on F1TV Ham onboard Lewis even admits its going to be hard to keep Max behind him on the newer tyre. Im not sure what more defending one can realistically give.

Yeah that what I also watched on F1 TV! Why I think Russell would have been able to defend from Max though?

Well slipstream! At least for the restart Russell could have used Hamilton’s slipstream to at least keep Max behind him for the first lap! Hamilton had no one in front of him to gain a slipstream so that’s why Max got him half way down the straight.

Anyway, i think the great opportunity would have been to pit Hamilton for softs and get him out back into P1 ahead of Russell…then use Russell as a buffer for a few laps!