Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton won at Portuguese Grand Prix to secure record-breaking 92nd win on Sunday. The Briton equaled Michael Schumacher’s 91 wins in style at the Nurburgring, pushing teammate Valtteri Bottas to go into the red and then foul.
“On Saturday morning, we tried two different wing levels. We’d started the weekend with a lighter wing, and I think it was definitely the right decision to go for.” Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said.
“The more downforce would have helped us today, and whether the drops of rain would have turned into a proper shower. But Hamilton is more talking about how he got the balance of the car to sort of use the tyres not be too hart on either end.
“In the race, it’s the left-hand-side tyres that get a hammering here, and just not working the front or the rear too much, because then the balance starts to get away from you.
“Lewis is just naturally good at managing the tyres. He’s got this really good feel for where he’s hurting them. And he’s able to keep the rubber on them.” Shovlin added.
Despite teammate Bottas’ call for the soft compound tyres, after Hamilton pitted for the hard tyres, after spending half the race on mediums, the Finn was also placed onto the hard compound when he came in.
“We spend 90% of races where we’ve actually got too much of it, and it’s a case of trying to keep the tyres cool, but you’re in the opposite situation here in these cold conditions made worse with a bit og light rain kicking around.” Shovlin said.
“It was most evident on that hard tyre transition. So Lewis actually got it to work quite well, quite quickly. Valtteri dropped into some backmarker traffic, which meant he was having to run at their pace, not the natural pace, and at that point, there was about 10 degrees of difference in the tyre temperature.” he added.
