Lewis Hamilton admitted he had “mixed feelings” and expressed sympathy for team-mate George Russell after inheriting victory in the Belgian Grand Prix when his Mercedes team-mate’s car was disqualified from the race.
Russell, meanwhile, described his post-race disqualification for an underweight car as “heartbreaking”.
The British pair had earlier crossed the finishing line nose-to-nail in a gripping conclusion to the race at Spa-Francorchamps on Sunday having adopted different pit-stop strategies.
After a storming start from third on the grid, Hamilton had led the race’s first half on a conventional two-stop strategy but lost track position to Russell, who had gambled on a bold one-stopper having run only fifth through the first stint.
But Russell’s car was later found to be underweight by the FIA technical delegate and subsequently disqualified from the results, with Hamilton promoted from second to the win – his fifth at Spa and record-extending 105th of his career.
In a post on Instagram on Sunday evening, Hamilton said: “Mixed feelings for today’s result. Obviously happy to get the win but I feel for George and it’s disappointing for the team not to get the one-two.
“A lot of positives to take from today, though. At the start of the weekend, we didn’t expect to be at the front or the pace we had, so it’s great to see just how much progress has been made and that we are in the fight. We take all these positives with us into the break and will come back a stronger team ready to keep the momentum going.”
In a further, later post via his Instagram story, Hamilton added: “Great drive today @georgerussell63, really am gutted for you and the team losing the win and also our 1-2 which the team deserved. Let’s keep pushing, work towards another 1-2 in the second half.”
In an earlier post on his own Instagram account, a disappointed Russell had said: “Heartbreaking… We came in 1.5kg underweight and have been disqualified from the race.
“We left it all on the track today and I take pride in crossing the line first.
“There will be more to come.”
Mercedes admit: It’s clearly not good enough
Having lost what would have been their first one-two result since the Sao Paulo GP of November 2022 through the technical infringement, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff apologised to Russell for the error and said they would now assess what had gone wrong on his car to leave it underweight.
In their post-race press release, trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin suspected that rubber lost from Russell’s 34-lap-old tyres during the Briton’s mammoth final stint was likely a “contributing factor” to the car failing the mandatory post-race weight check – although he admitted it was still “clearly not good enough” that Mercedes had fallen foul of the rules.
“We don’t yet understand why the car was underweight following the race but will investigate thoroughly to find the explanation,” said Shovlin.
“We expect that the loss of rubber from the one stop was a contributing factor, and we’ll work to understand how it happened. We won’t be making any excuses, though.
“It is clearly not good enough and we need to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Mercedes also made significant set-up changes to their cars after a difficult Friday practice when the W15 proved to be off the pace. Saturday’s running was then wet throughout, meaning the first time the overhauled car next ran in the dry was during the race.
Hamilton’s car was found to be in compliance with the weight limit, along with the rest of the grid.
Explained: What could have caught Mercedes out?
Sky Sports F1’s Bernie Collins, a former race strategist in the sport, explains the factors which could have contributed to Russell’s W15 ending up underweight in the parc-ferme checks:
In advance of qualifying, as that’s when the car is in parc ferme, the team will have to estimate the lightest the car will be through qualifying and the lightest it will be in the race. In qualifying, it’s easy because you estimate, normally, for a dry tyre.
When we look at the race, it’s the end of the race when the car is the lightest because you should have used all your fuel, engine oil, driver drinks and the plank is worn and in this case, the tyres are worn. We try to get an estimate for what all those numbers add up to at the end of the race and what it will be.
Normally the strategists and tyre engineers, together, will look at what the strategy might be, how many laps you are likely to do on a tyre, and that will dictate the tyre wear, so how light you expect the tyres to be at the end of the race, which is part of the total car weight.
In this case, George has done double the expected number of laps on that tyre set. Even if there was margin in there or allowed for a one-stop, they probably haven’t allowed for a one-stop pitting on lap 10, so it’s a significantly longer stint than anyone would have expected in tyre wear rate.
In Spa, there’s no in-lap. Normally, drivers try to pick up rubber, that’s just a safety net for car weight. That doesn’t exist in Spa. The normal get-out clause you have is not there.
To add to that, if you have a load of pickup on your tyres. The FIA can ask for a different set of tyres to be fitted to the car, if they think that other set of tyres are lighter, but they very rarely do it.
What did Hamilton say about the race before Russell’s DSQ?
Although he ultimately left Belgium with his second win in the last three races to maintain a season that is suddenly fast gathering momentum, Hamilton had earlier appeared irritated that he had lost out to Russell having led the majority of the race courtesy of a storming start from third on the grid.
Speaking immediately after the race before news of the weight problem with his team-mate’s car emerged, Hamilton accused Mercedes of getting his strategy wrong.
Hamilton told Sky Sports F1: “George wasn’t really in my race for most of it.
“And so if the strategy if had been right, he wouldn’t have been in my race. So, we wouldn’t have been having that (battle) but it’s great that at the end we do have cars that are competing.
“It is what it is. I’ll move forward. I’ll go into my break and have a good time.”
Belgian GP driver rater
Formula 1 returns after the summer break with the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort on August 23-25, live on Sky Sports F1. Stream every F1 race and more with a NOW Sports Month Membership – No contract, cancel anytime