Hamilton and Russell believe that Imola will be better than Miami for Mercedes.
Returning to a traditional weekend at the 2024 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix will help Mercedes over the Miami sprint round, according to Lewis Hamilton and George Russell, who expect the Silver Arrows to rebound at Imola.
Mercedes’ dreary Miami GP weekend yielded only 12 points, which has not been an oddity in 2024 for the erstwhile Formula 1 powerhouse; it was actually their best Grand Prix finish since the season-opening Bahrain GP.
Despite the lack of significant upgrades at Imola, both drivers believe having three free practice sessions to prepare the W15 for qualifying will help their prospects in an F1 running order that remains unpredictable following Lando Norris’ Florida victory.
“I think it’s so difficult to know exactly where it’s going to fall out right now in F1,” Russell told a small group of journalists, including Total-Motorsport.com. “Red Bull will be in the lead and fighting for victory, but the three teams behind them – Aston Martin appeared to be quite up and down as well – you really can’t say.
“But I think we’re glad that it’s a conventional race weekend now and that will allow us to build up during the weekend rather than just throwing a setup down and hoping that it works.”
Mercedes at least saved their best performance for Sunday in Miami, as Hamilton was less than two-tenths away from fifth place after keeping pace with Sergio Perez in the final stint and Carlos Sainz‘s post-race penalty dropped the Spaniard down the order.
That fifth would’ve equalled the team’s best finish of the season – a stark contrast to the glory days like 2019 when Mercedes’ worst result after six races was a solitary third place, Hamilton won six of the first eight grand prix of the season and teammate Valtteri Bottas picked up the other two.
However, Hamilton echoed Russell‘s prediction of an upturn in form at Imola – a venue he controversially crowned as the most iconic Italian F1 race.
“The day before we had a different setup and I changed the car for qualifying for the Sunday’s race,” Hamilton added.
“And it goes back what George was mentioning earlier. We had that one session and we’re still in this discovery process with this car and it’s not easy to extract its maximum performance, it’s a very small window.
“I was stuck mostly in traffic the day before, but we weren’t particularly hugely quick. Then with the changes that I made the Sunday setup was a lot better, I think he [Perez] was still quicker, but I was in his DRS most of the time. But it was great to be close.”
