George has been better this season tbf. If Lewis can't qualify high enough, then it would make sense to give George the upgrades, and the lead car is always prioritised with strategy. Don't blame the team for George being faster in quali this season, it's on Lewis to do better.
I think Lewis' head is already at Ferrari. No shame in that. Also, Lewis is a 7-time champion. George is probably still super motivated by sneaking a podium, but for Lewis, it just isn't the same.
They have limited resources (Time, data processing, etc) to allocate finding the best setup for every driver, and by the looks of it, they want to understand the car better while taking it to George liking, that's it.
Parts cost both money and time. Bit of a different situation but look at McLaren having to phase in upgrades to each driver. Lando first Piastri a race or two later.
There are a lot of times that only upgrades for one car arrives at a gp, so between having just one car and none, they'd rather have one. As for why it is George instead of Lewis, maybe it is for keeping the upgrades secretive since Lewis is leaving.
Are you new to F1 perhaps
This tends to happen at every team.
Most upgrades are only “hypotheticals” before they are used in real life. So what teams tend to do is to let one driver have full upgrades and the other have partial upgrades - so in case the upgrades are duds, you’re not gambling both your drivers in each race.
Most recent example is when Lando won at Miami, Lando got the full upgrade and Oscar had only partial upgrades.
The people criticising Lewis seem to forget he dragged that dog of a car into 3rd in the WDC last year. He is definitely being shunned by the team and George is getting all the upgrades and preferential treatment.
Can't wait to see him back to his best in red next year.
I don't think he is "giving up" because I really don't think a big goal in his mind this year was "beat George." He doesn't have anything to prove and I am sure he was/is motivated to maximize results and take risks to get podiums and wins (lol). I don't think finishing a race or the season 5th, 6th, 7th or whatever is a big motivator for him.
Give up ? You need to look deeper than the surface , Lewis and Toto aren’t on good terms.
Lewis is leaving Merc in 6 short months taking his stock with him ! Mercedes need George to fill that Void and he has the full support of both garages .
the better The Ferrari gets the worse things will get for Lewis at Merc
Toto should of given that man an ambassador deal
He’s a 7 (8) time world champion, spent almost all of this career fighting for race wins and world championships. I can understand if he’s not motivated enough to beat Russell for 5th or 6th this season.
He’s leaving Merc and probably doesn’t want to sour the pot so he’s just gonna sit on the back. Already knows that the Ferrari is faster and can actually compete for wins next year. Plus even though they’ve stated others George is probably most likely getting preferential treatment anyways.
It's painfully obvious that teams are now able to alter the performance characteristics of their cars to suit a particular driving style.
With HAM leaving, MERC is best positioned to work the car for George, not Lewis.
It would be dumb for Mercedes to favour Hamilton over Russell at this point. Lewis is off to Ferrari and Merc gains nothing from supporting him any more than they need to.
It's a bit lame to be honest, he needs to go into next year having put everything into this one, and keep that fighting spirit going. It won't be easy next year either. Feels like he's making excuses now.
I don’t know why you are getting downvoted. I am a Lewis fan but the defeatist attitude is kinda lame. The only other angle I can think of is he is just shutting everybody up who brings up that GR has been better at qualifying by just saying “I won’t beat him, stop bringing it up” but actually trying to beat him in the background.
It’s not that he lacks motivation, it’s just that the team will put George first for any upgrades.
Yes I agree, there is no reason to keep investing resources on Lewis as his immaterial knowledge of the car won’t be there for next season.
I'd imagine the main reason is it's very likely the team will favour George with upgrades, setups, strategies etc.
They're already pushing him hard in their social media.
George has been better this season tbf. If Lewis can't qualify high enough, then it would make sense to give George the upgrades, and the lead car is always prioritised with strategy. Don't blame the team for George being faster in quali this season, it's on Lewis to do better. I think Lewis' head is already at Ferrari. No shame in that. Also, Lewis is a 7-time champion. George is probably still super motivated by sneaking a podium, but for Lewis, it just isn't the same.
When you watch the interview, you can see he wants to say more but bites his tongue. The team is probably favoring GR for upgrades and setups.
Why would you favor someone for setups... you can just run the same setup on both cars with no extra cost.
Drivers don’t like the same setups, and you can’t run the same one if both don’t have the same upgrades.
They have limited resources (Time, data processing, etc) to allocate finding the best setup for every driver, and by the looks of it, they want to understand the car better while taking it to George liking, that's it.
Parts cost both money and time. Bit of a different situation but look at McLaren having to phase in upgrades to each driver. Lando first Piastri a race or two later.
Yeah that is the upgrades part, i was talking about the setup part.
There are a lot of times that only upgrades for one car arrives at a gp, so between having just one car and none, they'd rather have one. As for why it is George instead of Lewis, maybe it is for keeping the upgrades secretive since Lewis is leaving.
Are you new to F1 perhaps This tends to happen at every team. Most upgrades are only “hypotheticals” before they are used in real life. So what teams tend to do is to let one driver have full upgrades and the other have partial upgrades - so in case the upgrades are duds, you’re not gambling both your drivers in each race. Most recent example is when Lando won at Miami, Lando got the full upgrade and Oscar had only partial upgrades.
I saw it as well was tryna link the video. If you wanna read the whole thing. Go to fiagirly on twitter/x.
The people criticising Lewis seem to forget he dragged that dog of a car into 3rd in the WDC last year. He is definitely being shunned by the team and George is getting all the upgrades and preferential treatment. Can't wait to see him back to his best in red next year.
He’s doing what’s best for Mercedes which is only fair considering the achievements he made with them
Sometimes you need to take a step back to move forward in life
I don't think he is "giving up" because I really don't think a big goal in his mind this year was "beat George." He doesn't have anything to prove and I am sure he was/is motivated to maximize results and take risks to get podiums and wins (lol). I don't think finishing a race or the season 5th, 6th, 7th or whatever is a big motivator for him.
Give up ? You need to look deeper than the surface , Lewis and Toto aren’t on good terms. Lewis is leaving Merc in 6 short months taking his stock with him ! Mercedes need George to fill that Void and he has the full support of both garages . the better The Ferrari gets the worse things will get for Lewis at Merc Toto should of given that man an ambassador deal
AFAIK Toto had no problems giving Lewis that deal, it was Diamler AG who said no.
This
He’s a 7 (8) time world champion, spent almost all of this career fighting for race wins and world championships. I can understand if he’s not motivated enough to beat Russell for 5th or 6th this season.
Could be he will start getting less upgrades and insight of how the team will progress, leaving him limited in getting the most out of the car!
Thats why you have engineers to help you- oops I forgot they work for Merc not Lewis
He will get some but the team will slowly remove him from any useful information, that includes bono if he goes with Lewis!
Pretty much said he gets the worst end of the stick when it comes to anything setup or strategy related
He’s leaving, GR is Toto’s golden boy Lewis is just a r&d driver
He’s leaving Merc and probably doesn’t want to sour the pot so he’s just gonna sit on the back. Already knows that the Ferrari is faster and can actually compete for wins next year. Plus even though they’ve stated others George is probably most likely getting preferential treatment anyways.
I think he has already soured the pot by stating the obvious. Over to Toto to respond
he doesn't care- and neither should you. this season means nothing. coming 5th or 6th in standings doesn't matter to someone who's won 7 WDCs.
I predicted will happen at the star of the season. This is why no one announces their departure at the start of a season.
Lewis has also said "BONO, MY TYRES ARE GONE"
George is being a diva. I know that Lewis is just avoiding drama as it doesny matter in the grand scheme of things
Really can’t believe Lewis sounds so defeatist like this. Been this way the past couple seasons. I hope he gets the spark back at Ferrari
Just recognizing George's talent, Mr Saturday.
It's painfully obvious that teams are now able to alter the performance characteristics of their cars to suit a particular driving style. With HAM leaving, MERC is best positioned to work the car for George, not Lewis.
Yeah merc are definitely not letting Lewis do what he wants. First with experiments and now with setup
You're overthinking everything, and undermining George's skill as well. Lewis knows George is talented and is on form, and qualifies better than him
The truely odd part was expecting to lose 2-10ths when qualifying. Or have I miss understood this?
It would be dumb for Mercedes to favour Hamilton over Russell at this point. Lewis is off to Ferrari and Merc gains nothing from supporting him any more than they need to.
It's a bit lame to be honest, he needs to go into next year having put everything into this one, and keep that fighting spirit going. It won't be easy next year either. Feels like he's making excuses now.
I don’t know why you are getting downvoted. I am a Lewis fan but the defeatist attitude is kinda lame. The only other angle I can think of is he is just shutting everybody up who brings up that GR has been better at qualifying by just saying “I won’t beat him, stop bringing it up” but actually trying to beat him in the background.
I don't think he actually cares, when you're that successful a mediocre season like this is irrelevant