© Jiri Krenek for Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix Ltd.
Lewis Hamilton clarifies the comments he made on George Russell’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix setup, because some have interpreted it as Lewis saying George was ‘lucky’.
After the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton said he would have been “in a better position”, had he had “the setup George had”.
He was then asked how much of a say he has when it comes to picking the setup.
“We work on that,“ Lewis said at the time.
“There was like a 50-50 choice. I chose one way and he chose another. More often than not, the way he went is the wrong one.
“But it just happened to work, so I could only match his pace than be quicker this weekend.
“But I’ll work hard to make sure we are in a better place next time,” he concluded.
Some observers have interpreted this as Lewis saying George was ‘lucky’, so ahead of the Australian Grand Prix, George was asked to give his comments.
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“I don’t think there’s any luck in it at all,” Russell said at the Thursday press conference.
“I think it’s down to the preparation you put in before the event. The changes we made overnight, I knew that was going to be the right direction with the work we did with the team.
“And I believed it was going to be better than the setup that Lewis opted for. I think everybody’s got different preferences.
“I was happy with the direction I took and the work I’m doing with the engineers,” the Briton concluded.
Later, Lewis was also asked to clarify his original comments.
“I think people probably, from my choice of words at the weekend… I want to reiterate how great a job George did on the weekend,” Hamilton said.
“I think the thing I was commenting on is that there’s one specific thing that you can change in the suspension that you have to do over Friday night.
“And when you make that change, once you start P3 [Free Practice 3], you can’t change it for the rest of the weekend.
“So when you make that change, you’re basically rolling the dice. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
“I’ve done it in the past, sometimes it hasn’t worked, sometimes it has, and it worked great for George and he did a great job.
“And the thing that I was lacking in the race was a lot of front end, which that setup gives you, so, in hindsight that would’ve been great.
“We took lots of learnings from it. I think race pace was quite decent, particularly in the second stint.
“And for us to move forward and get fourth and fifth place was great points for the team and a great result considering where we are in terms of performance deficit,” Lewis concluded.
