Lewis Hamilton concurs with Esteban Ocon in playing down that their current F1 teams are keeping them away from key meetings.
With both Hamilton and Ocon to leave Mercedes and Alpine respectively at the end of the 2024 F1 season, stories always comes through of them being kept away from key meetings from which they could learn things about what they are upto in 2025.
But both have played down any such suggestions. As is the protocol and also an expected thing, they are kept away from any meeting which talks about the 2025 car and or of the 2026 project, which both Ocon and Hamilton understand it completely.
In fact, they are very much in discussions with their future F1 teams as well about what is happening on that side of things. “I can tell you that this is complete nonsense,” said Ocon. “I haven’t been excluded from any meetings at the moment. I think the team would lose out from one more comment about the car and the drive moving forward if there was only 50% of the comment going on.
“So that hasn’t been the case. I just hope it won’t be the case. Of course, I’m not going to spend time working on next year’s car. That is very clear, but it’s also something that I can spend more time on, focusing on the 2024 machine. Otherwise, there’s nothing else to say, but it’s not as clear-cut as you think it is, or as you might say.
Meanwhile, Hamilton concurred: “Similar for me. I mean, I haven’t been excluded from any meetings and we’re still working on this car and trying to get the car to the front. So it’s still very collaborative. And I mean, I’ve been here a long time. So if there’s a point where they’re like, we’re preferring not to be in this meeting, that’s totally fine with me.
“I mean, it’s inevitable perhaps at one stage, but at the end of the day, Nothing I have, no information that I would get this year will impact next year because I’m not in communication. Nothing passes hands until I start the season next year. And it takes time to develop things.”
Here’s Esteban Ocon getting his race-winning Alpine
Here’s Lewis Hamilton on wanting to end on a high
Here’s link to a F1 Discord channel, join in to interact
