18/06/2022
NEWS STORY
Despite Mercedes best efforts to overcome its porpoising issues, Lewis Hamilton insists the problem is getting worse as he appears to write-off the season.
The FIA's technical directive aside, Mercedes, who had the added benefit of having technical boss, James Allison on-site, tried its own solution to the porpoising issue, including a new floor featuring a large cut-out.
While George Russell ran a more standard floor, Hamilton tried the new one, but by the second session had reverted to the original. In the earlier session he finished 8th, just 0.055s off his teammate's pace, but in FP2 he was 0.450s down in thirteenth.
Asked his opinion at the conclusion of the day's on-track activities, the seven-time champion replied: "Pretty much like every Friday... trying lots of different things, an experimental floor on my side which didn't work.
"Nothing we do generally to this car seems to work," he continued, "so we're trying different set-ups.
"Me and George went with much different set-ups in this FP2," he confirmed, "just to see if one way works and one way doesn't. I'll wait to hear how it felt for him, but for me it was a disaster.
"It's like the car's getting worse," he sighed. "It's getting more and more unhappy the more we do to it.
"I don't know, we'll keep working on it. It is what it is. I think this is the car for the year, so we'll just have to tough it out and work hard on building a better car for next year.
"We’re going to get this fixed by the end of next year at least," he added. "So hopefully that’s not going to be something to stop me racing for longer. But time will tell."
Anyone hearing that and feeling the Briton is feeling totally dejected, will appreciate that Hamilton simply isn't enjoying himself at present, even at a track he loves.
"It's not the Montreal that I know, that I'm used to and that I've experienced in my career," he said. "It's the worse that I've ever felt any car here. It's just a monumental fight the whole time to keep it out of the wall.
"One touch of the kerbs here and the car goes flying, it's so stiff, and here in Montreal you really need to ride the kerbs. When it bounces, when the car leaves the ground a lot, and then when it lands it grips up and it goes in different directions, and you're just trying to catch a car that jumps, hops, grips, hops, grips...
"It's tough. It keeps you on edge. And there were some big hits today, we've raised the car, but it doesn't make a difference. We've tried loads and loads of things. We've ticked them all off.
"Those ones don't work, we have to go and find something else. We're way off, but it's to be expected with this car. I'm hoping overnight we can try and make some changes, but fundamentally it's just the fundamentals of the car. It is what it is. It's going to be a struggle."