Reuters
Formula One F1 – Azerbaijan Grand Prix – Baku City Circuit, Baku, Azerbaijan – June 12, 2022 Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton on the grid before the race REUTERS/Hamad I Mohammed/Pool
Reuters
Formula One F1 – Azerbaijan Grand Prix – Baku City Circuit, Baku, Azerbaijan – June 12, 2022 Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton on the grid before the race REUTERS/Hamad I Mohammed/Pool
The 2022 Azerbaijan Grand Prix has to be one of the physically toughest for Lewis Hamilton. The 7-time world champion was in serious pain after he got out of his car as he finished 4th in the race.
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He complained of having back pains throughout the race because of porpoising in the W13. Hamilton revealed that he was experiencing around 10 Gs in the car because of the issue. He has been struggling with the issue since the beginning of the season, but it is causing him more headaches now.
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The W13 has been one of the worst affected by porpoising in the 2022 season. Yet the British driver claims that they have done everything they can to reduce the issue as much as possible.
Lewis Hamilton explains the measures taken by the team to counter porpoising
One of the ways by which one can reduce the problem is by raising the ride height of the car. But Hamilton claimed that they have done that in the previous races but are still struggling with the problem.
“In the last race and previous races, we have raised the car, and you still have bouncing. Porpoising, it’s more about the flow structure underneath the car – so we run the car very high most seasons and it’s not until Barcelona that we started to be able to get it a little bit lower and we had no bouncing for the first time in Barcelona, except for the high-speed corners,” said the Mercedes driver.
Reuters
Formula One F1 – Azerbaijan Grand Prix – Baku City Circuit, Baku, Azerbaijan – June 10, 2022, Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton after practice alongside his physiotherapist Angela Cullen REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger
“Even when we raised the car [in Monaco and Baku, to deal with the bumps], this thing still bounces. And we can’t go any higher, actually. We’re limited by the rear suspension now,” said Hamilton.
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Many drivers, including Hamilton, are afraid that the problem might become a safety issue very soon. But not every driver and team on the grid seem to be struggling as much as Mercedes from porpoising.
Maybe the team can follow the structure of other teams who are not struggling as much to reduce the effect of the problem. But it is hard to see Hamilton struggling to even get out of his car because of the back pain. Let’s see if the problem continues for the team going into the next races in 2022.
