Lewis Hamilton Reveals Biggest Problem With Ferrari SF-26 After Austin

Lewis Hamilton left the United States Grand Prix feeling bittersweet. The British Ferrari driver finished fourth in Austin behind his teammate Charles Leclerc and pointed to the SF-26's balance problems as the main cause of his lack of pace, a recurring complaint throughout the season that the seven-time world champion hopes to solve in the next races.

"I didn't have a new tire to start so it put me at a bit of a disadvantage compared to the cars ahead of me. I had a little more degradation in that first stint than they did; a new tire versus a used one means about two seconds of race pace, so I lost that in the first stint, but balance was my biggest problem. The balance was unbalanced; however, I think the team did a great job in the stops and the strategy," Hamilton declared after the race.

The Briton also acknowledged that he needs to work more to find the right setup from the start of the weekend: "I really have to try to extract more from this car in the next races, I think I could be faster if we could adjust the configuration well, it wasn't very far off, well, it was at the start of the stint and I just need to investigate how to reach that conclusion and how I end up in that situation because it has happened several times, like at Silverstone, for example, I couldn't follow Charles because he had much more front wing than me and then I couldn't turn the car; it was the same today" he explained.

Despite the difficulties, Hamilton showed optimism about the future: "I think Charles obviously did a great job this weekend for us; it's good for the points to be ahead of McLaren so that we can keep second place in the Constructors' Championship," he added.

Leclerc, for his part, celebrated his second consecutive podium and showed himself satisfied with his performance in Austin: "It was a good race and I enjoyed the race. I enjoyed the first lap with Max; later, I enjoyed it again with Lando and Max, and that was nice. The pace was also quite strong; however, Mercedes saw something that Red Bull and I didn't seriously consider: the one-stop, and they made it work very well. So this is something we will have to analyze, but the whole race has been very good, and in any case, I think if we had gone to a one-stop, it wouldn't have changed the results much," the Monegasque declared.

Leclerc also referred to the improvements introduced by Ferrari in Austin and their impact on the future: "I think so, but only time will tell. I think in the last three or four races we've had updates on the car in a direction I quite like, and we are pushing, which makes me feel a little more confident in the car, so I am optimistic for the future. Then it is also true that we are at the end of the season; we don't expect to bring big updates, but now it's about optimizing what we have and we are not in a bad place, so I am looking forward to seeing how it will be on different tracks in the next two weeks" he concluded.

Ferrari faces the final stretch of the season with high morale and hopes to maintain its good form in the remaining races.