Another year, another (likely) winless campaign for Lewis Hamilton. For someone who had gotten used to winning as often as he did, the past two seasons have been nightmares for Hamilton. Despite the struggles this year, though, the seven-time champion has sealed P3 in the Drivers’ Championship. At least there’s that. Even though this was a season to forget for him, he would’ve wanted to finish it off on a high at the Abu Dhabi GP. But from the looks of it, that may not happen.

Throughout the weekend, Lewis Hamilton struggled with his W14. Yes, that’s been the story of the season for him and Mercedes. The W14 just hasn’t been consistent enough. The thing is, though, his teammate George Russell found pace not just in Abu Dhabi but also in Las Vegas last weekend. So what’s going wrong for the seven-time champion? 

After yet another disappointing qualifying—a P11 for the second race running—Hamilton was understandably upset. When asked how the W14 felt throughout the weekend, and especially in qualifying, he didn’t have anything good to say. “Not great. Just struggling with balance. I don’t have any answers at this point. It is what it is,” rued Hamilton. At the Las Vegas GP, Russell looked quicker all weekend. While he may have finished one place behind Hamilton in the race, the 25-year-old was more at one with the W14. To help Hamilton’s case in Abu Dhabi, Mercedes decided to experiment with his car and make it similar to Russell’s.

Considering Russell’s setup worked in Las Vegas and Hamilton’s did not, tuning the car to Russell’s specifications for Abu Dhabi made sense. Especially since Mercedes had to be on top of its form in its fight for P2 in the Constructors’ Championship against Ferrari. With Hamilton’s P11 and Russell’s P4, it obviously didn’t work in the Brackley team’s favor. The experiment didn’t work, and Hamilton explained, “[Russell and I] set up our cars the same, but they don’t drive the same.”

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While emotions about qualifying were a little better on the other side of the Mercedes garage, George Russell wasn’t too happy with his starting place either. With the Mercedes duo in a direct fight with Ferrari for P2, the scales are in Ferrari’s favor.

Russell’s secret to a good showing didn’t help Mercedes’ case against Ferrari

Following his P4 in qualifying, Russell was pretty pleased with his performance. But he couldn’t help but think of what could’ve been. He explained what went right for him, saying, “I’ve been really ill the last two weeks, and I’ve been really quick, so maybe I need to be ill.” Even though P4 is a good place to start the race, he revealed, “Mixed feelings right now. We would have definitely taken P4. But this morning, we were quicker, pretty much every lap, but couldn’t take the jump we expected.”

The thing is, Mercedes desperately needed that jump. After looking on par with Ferrari all weekend, Russell qualified behind Charles Leclerc in P2. With Hamilton in P11 and Carlos Sainz in P16, it will be Russell versus Leclerc in front, while Hamilton and Sainz will try to recover, just like they did in Vegas. Since there are just four points separating the two teams—Mercedes ahead of Ferrari—Hamilton & Co. have to make amends on Sunday, especially because Carlos Sainz thinks “[Ferrari] has the potential to recover and do better”

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