Hamilton wants even more fundamental changes: "I've been asking for them for a year already"

Lewis Hamilton says that Mercedes is finally heading in the right direction with the developments on the W14, but that more fundamental changes are needed before he can find the limit. Particularly, having confidence in the car to get closer to the limit is a key factor in the progress of the project, and Hamilton hasn't fully achieved that yet.

After a difficult start to the 2023 season, the team started pursuing a different concept when introducing the first series of upgrades for the current W14 model in Monaco. The revised car then showed signs of good progress in Spain and also performed well in the Canadian GP on a circuit where it wasn't expected to favor the car. "Yeah, finally! We brought a lot of upgrades last year, and we did make some progress," Hamilton kicked off the interview with Motorsport.com.

"But we found with this generation of car, adding performance was not easy. When you added performance in the wind tunnel, it looked like it was real performance. But then you put them on the car, and the car would bounce more," explains the seven-time world champion. Having confidence in the car was particularly important for the British driver. "Confidence is a huge thing. You have to be confident that when you carry 150-180 miles an hour into a corner, the car is going to be with you and support you through that."

Hamilton stresses that more "fundamental changes are needed to be competitive in 2024"

It took a while for Hamilton to regain that confidence. "And the past year's car has been so spiteful in that space – you saw the shock I had here last year. So you really then have to pull back, and just can't get near the limit," explains the 38-year-old. The Mercedes driver expects improvements with the W14 this year in Austria, especially after his podium finishes in Spain and Canada. "The changes in the direction that we're going have enabled me to start to explore that more, and have more confidence in pushing closer to the limit, but I'm still not able to get to the limit. And so we have to make some more changes."

So, despite the recent changes and the resulting improvement in performance, Hamilton believes that there are still fundamental changes needed to be competitive with the W15 in 2024. "And I've been asking for it for over a year. So I expect to have that in future, which I think will definitely help," continues the Brit. "But it's not only that, it's the rear end, and how it rotates through a corner. But we're working on that, and the team are very, very focused on that. I think we've got some progress coming over the coming months, which will help also help rectify that. So I'm excited."

"I hope we can compete with Ferrari and Aston"

As for the outlook for the race weekend in Austria, Hamilton has some expectations. I think the surface is very similar to Barcelona. So we are hopeful that we can be relatively competitive, I think. So I think Red Bull will be ahead, they always go really well here. I just hope that we can compete with Ferrari and Aston." Hamilton concludes.

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