F1 News
Hamilton adamant he'd have done a better job than Russell in Dutch GP
Lewis Hamilton believes he would've "definitely" finished fourth in the Dutch Grand Prix had he started in that position. Hamilton's Mercedes teammate, George Russell, did actually start the Zandvoort race from fourth on the grid but dropped backwards to P7 when the chequered flag dropped.
Hamilton had another Dutch disaster in qualifying. The seven-time World Champion failed to escape Q2 for the second year running. To make matters worse, he picked up a three-place grid penalty for impeding Sergio Perez in Q1. Hamilton started from P14 on the grid and slowly advanced through to finish in eighth, one place behind his teammate.
Hamilton kicking himself over qualifying in the Dutch Grand Prix
"If I just qualified like I should’ve qualified and if I didn’t have a problem in qualifying, then yeah [I would have finished higher],” Hamilton told GPblog and others in the paddock at Zandvoort. "I think I had the pace today to definitely [finish] in the top 5. If I started fourth, for example, then I would’ve finished at least fourth."
All starters inside the top ten opted for the medium tyre. Being far behind, Hamilton wanted to try something different and opted for a 'quick' start by using the soft tyres. He then analysed his strategy.
"We planned to do a two stop and started on the soft, it was a very good tyre. The soft tyre felt better than the medium tyre on practice day. The hard tyre was fairly decent, it was really difficult to see what I needed to do whether to push, I was on a two, so trying to use up the tyre but wasn’t sure whether or not we might go for a one. I had a bit of a lock up which meant I had to stay on my strategy. Probably if I’d have done one stop I might have managed it a bit better, maybe finish one place ahead," Hamilton concluded.