Hamilton downbeat after losing out to Russell again
Lewis Hamilton had been feeling this would be a breakthrough weekend for both him and for the Mercedes team, and was disappointed when Monaco qualifying failed to live up to expectations.
Hamilton had been quickest in first practice on Friday and was still in the top two in FP2 later in the day, describing it as the team's best on-track performance of the season to date.
He was third fastest behind Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen in final practice and went into qualifying buoyed with optimism of getting a strong grid position, and out-qualifying his team mate George Russell for only the second time in 2024.
But n the end Hamilton only managed to finish Q3 in seventh place, putting him two spots behind Russell on tomorrow's grid.
Russell did have the benefit of running the team's new front wing specification of which they have only one on hand this weekend, and Hamilton said that this had put him at an immediate disadvantage.
“We’ve really been working hard to improve this car and from the get go it felt great and we were obviously competitive yesterday and this morning," he told Sky Sports F1 after the end of qualifying.
“The team have worked really hard back at the factory to bring an upgrade in the last two races and also an update this weekend," he continued. "We only have one which George has, but it’s just great to see that we are bringing upgrades.
“So I anticipated it would be difficult to out-qualify George because he has the upgraded component," he added. “I already know automatically that I’m going to lose two tenths going into qualifying.
"There was a bit of a difference with our cars in the high-speed corners as George is running the new wing this weekend," he commented.
However he admitted that his own pace with the older spec wing had been a letdown.
"The car has felt great this weekend from the get-go and we were competitive through Friday and this morning in practice.
"I've been pushing the limits everywhere and the qualifying laps felt good. But each time I go into qualifying, I struggle to keep making progress with the car and it feels like I lose performance relative to the cars around me.
"I don’t understand," he sighed. “I’m not driving any differently, the laps were really great. I’m just lacking something.
“But I definitely think we for some reason are a lot closer this weekend. It’s really great to see. The car was feeling great, so much better than previous years," although he admitted the gap to Red Bull and Ferrari was still too big.
"Three-and-a-half tenths is a lot here, and that’s still six tenths elsewhere, so we still are off pace-wise," he accepted. “We’ve just got to keep pushing. We will slowly get closer through the year as more upgrades come."
As for when he'll be back on top in the qualifying battle with his team mate, Hamilton admitted that it might simply not happen.
“I don’t anticipate being ahead of George in qualifying particularly this year, but we’ve just got to just keep pushing and the races are strong.”
When asked why he felt that was the case, he replied: “We’ll see.”
Despite his personal disappointment at the outcome of qualifying, Hamilton still felt that the weekend could prove to be a turning point to the season from the team's perspective.
"We have been much closer to the front here, and the car is feeling much better than it has in Monaco in previous years," he said. "We just have to keep on pushing and getting closer to the front through the year.
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