Lewis Hamilton declared the Silverstone track “still phenomenal” just 24 hours on from voicing concerns about how the current generation of Formula 1 cars would perform at the British Grand Prix circuit. It is one of the most iconic venues in motorsport and seen by drivers as a significant challenge, particularly the section featuring several high-speed corners in a row.
It is that sequence which also makes it a favourite among drivers, who love to go fast through those challenging corners and test the limits of their cars. But, speaking on Thursday, Hamilton told a press conference he was worried that Silverstone would feel like “a completely different circuit” in the power-starved current generation of cars.
“The fact we have long straights, it’s an unprecedented weekend in terms of the power deployment,” Hamilton said. “All the drivers have been talking in the drivers’ chat about how poor the power is going to be… So it’s a completely different track. Maybe we will still get to enjoy it where you’re not power-limited, but the best parts of the track are Copse and Becketts and Stowe and in those parts the power is just dropping.”
Those claims were made based on Ferrari‘s simulations of how their engines would perform in those high-speed parts of the track. But just a day later, after qualifying on pole for the Sprint race, Hamilton had changed his tune.
He beamed: “You even heard me in the press conference like, ‘The track is not going to be the same… because that is what we all thought. [But] the track is still phenomenal, the track still feels great. The engine drop off is nowhere near what we anticipated.
“Yesterday [Ferrari colleagues] were scaring me, they were like, ‘We are going to be six tenths off in a straight line to these guys. And then, today [in practice], all of a sudden, we are kind of there. I was like, ‘Is this real? Are they going to turn up in qualifying?’ And we were right there competing with them.”
Moments after getting out of his car, Hamiltond declared it “an amazing surprise” that he had the pace in his Ferrari to compete for pole. Charles Leclerc qualified fourth to cap a strong team performance for the Scuderia, though the Monegasque was disappointed with what he described on the radio as a “very poor lap”.
He said afterwards: “I don’t have the ease that I had with last year’s car and, even when I push, whenever I put things together, Lewis is more often at 100 percent of the potential of the car, which I’m not. So I’ve got to work on everything, really. I’m struggling to just be consistent, to be at my 100 percent.”