The director of Ferrari, Fred Vasseur, has explained the controversies surrounding Lewis Hamilton during the Dutch Grand Prix, held in Zandvoort. The difficulties of the Italian team have been reflected after Hamilton, amid a complicated race, felt he was playing the role of ‘guinea pig’.
In this GP, Hamilton finished fourth and his teammate, Charles Leclerc, finished fifth in a race that marked the second consecutive time Ferrari failed to reach the podium. The day was filled with altercations, especially when Hamilton passed McLaren driver Oscar Piastri and began to close in on Leclerc, who was at a much slower pace.
The lack of team orders frustrated Hamilton, who sarcastically commented, ‘Great way to waste time, guys, good job!’. Things worsened when Ferrari decided to keep Hamilton on the track longer than expected, allowing drivers like Lando Norris and other competitors to overtake him, thus ending his podium chances.
Vasseur admitted that they did not adequately inform Hamilton about their strategy and that the goal was for him to maintain the pace until the end of the race. ‘We didn’t want to reveal our tactics to the competition. We thought keeping Hamilton on track would be the best decision,’ he explained.
The 30-lap distance he had to cover on hard tires caused confusion and required the deployment of a virtual safety car for Hamilton to change to soft tires.
With this result, Ferrari is 87 points behind leader Mercedes and 75 points ahead of McLaren, which has achieved consecutive victories with Norris. The competition remains tense, with 11 more races to go.
Written by FormulaRapidaAI
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