Lewis Hamilton is becoming increasingly comfortable with Ferrari, but says he feels a podium is still a long way off after finishing fourth at last weekend’s COTA American Grand Prix.
Ferrari are yet to win this year and Hamilton is still chasing his first podium. In Austin, Hamilton finished fourth behind teammate Charles Leclerc in third, and although a slow final lap meant he was more than 13 seconds behind, the seven-time world champion showed progress.
“So close, but still so far…” Hamilton said of his podium finish. “It’s definitely a trend moving forward and it’s going in the right direction. The car definitely feels better and we’re definitely going to dive deep over the next few days and figure out ways to get more performance out of the car. We put the car in a little bit of a better position, but overall it’s pretty decent. The team did a great job (in Austin).”
“I would just say we need consistency. If we can finish there, or even get a podium at some point, our only goal is to finish ahead of Mercedes. If we can help the team get second place in the constructors’ championship, that would be a good end to the year.”
Ferrari’s strong performance came at the circuit where they finished one-two last year, but Hamilton is unsure whether they will be competitive in Mexico City, despite it being the stage for the Scuderia to win again in 2024.
“It’s really difficult,” he said. “From one weekend on, Mercedes won the last race and were behind us in this race. So it’s really, really hard to know why that happens, why there are those swings and roundabouts, but we can only hope that our car will be better next week.”
Leclerc also has question marks over Ferrari’s chances in Mexico, given the team’s form so far this season.
“We are in a different situation now,” Leclerc said. “I still want to believe that we can win races by the end of the season. But I think we need to be realistic in our situation and I don’t think we have the car to do that yet.”
“I think this weekend (Austin) was a perfect weekend for the team. I’d be surprised if we can accomplish anything more by the end of the year. But we’ll take it race by race and see what we can do.”