Lewis Hamilton apologised to Mercedes for the “devastating” early spin that sent him flying out of the United States GP on the race’s second lap – but his team boss Toto Wolff was sure it was “100 per cent not” the Briton’s fault.
Aiming to make up ground from 17th on the grid after his shock Q1 exit in qualifying on Saturday, Hamilton was up to 12th inside the race’s first two laps but then exited spectacularly as he turned into Turn 19 for the second time as the back end of the W15 snapped away from him.
The Mercedes spun around off the track and then became beached in the gravel, ending Hamilton’s race on the spot. Team-mate George Russell, who went on to finish the race in sixth after staging a fine recovery drive from the pit lane, had crashed at the same corner in qualifying on Saturday.
Explaining what had caught him by surprise in a car running the team’s latest package of upgrades, Hamilton told Sky Sports F1: “I mean that’s never happened before. A first for everything, I guess.
“I wasn’t even really pushing at that point. The car just started bouncing and Bono [race engineer Peter Bonnington] said I just got a 40kph tailwind but the left wheel was bouncing up in the air and then I lost the back end.
“We have three-wheeling sometimes, it’s been an issue for us. I’ve just never had that happen before.
“The same thing happened to George on this new update package that we worked so hard to bring. He’s fortunately doing a good job [in the race, where he finished sixth from the pit lane] but he’s got the old package on and it’ll be interesting to see if there’s learnings for it.”
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Highlights from the United States Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas.
An apologetic Hamilton, who had appeared on the nine previous Circuit of the America podiums (although was disqualified for a technical infringement after last year’s race) added: “It’s so upsetting, I’m so sorry to all the team back at the factory. I’ve never spun off in the race I don’t think before.
“Definitely it was not that I was not focused, I was really caught by surprise by this bouncing that I had and obviously I’m devastated.
“But onwards and upwards, what can I do? I’ll just try and prepare better for next week and hopefully have the car in a better place.”
Wolff: Hamilton does not lose the car like this | Did upgrade cause handling problems?
“100 percent car,” replied Wolff to Sky Sports F1 when asked what had gone wrong in the Hamilton spin.
“He was not even pushing at that stage. We saw it with George on Saturday, perhaps that was maybe over-pushing it, but still abrupt losing it and putting it in the wall.
“Today, there was wind and a bit of dirty air from the car in front. We definitely have an issue. I don’t know if yesterday was the same.
“Lewis Hamilton doesn’t lose the car on lap [two] like this.”
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Lewis Hamilton was stunned and confused at his early USA Grand Prix exit which saw the Mercedes driver spin out on lap three.
Speaking later to the written media in Austin, Wolff added: “Where I sit at the moment it’s 100 per cent not Lewis’ fault and that’s not to say that I’m protecting him.
“It’s clear it was gusty, there was a slipstream, how does all of that interact?”
Mercedes introduced their final upgrade of the season on to the W15 in Austin but ended up experiencing a curious weekend in which the car suffered wild fluctuations in performance and caught the drivers out in costly fashion on more than one occasion apiece.
After crashing out, also at Turn 19, at the end of qualifying and damaging his car, Russell started the race from the pit lane after the team had to revert to an older-specification of parts for their repairs having come into the weekend with only two new sets of the upgrades.
Underlining the confusing nature of the weekend, Russell then raced strongly in that older-spec to go from 20th to sixth, passing Red Bull’s Sergio Perez late on.
“I don’t think we have a fundamental issue on the upgrade very much,” said Wolff.
“I think it’s more interaction on aero and on the mechanical stuff. We are going to continue with the upgrade, it makes no sense to not because there is a lot of lap time you leave on the table. But on the other side you need to be very open minded.
“George drove the July upgrade because we didn’t have the floor and that seemed pretty competitive in the race. Having said that, if you are missing a few tenths in qualifying that makes a big difference because it’s just not as good as it should be.
“It’s more about getting on top on why do we have a car that on Friday is by far the quickest before the Colapinto situation – [Hamilton] was four tenths up and the last sector was just trouble, but he would have been quickest – and then on Saturday it’s transformed. In the Sprint race we had a broken suspension, that’s one explanation. We fixed that in qualifying and nothing would go anymore, we struggled with pace.
“Today an incident in that corner that came out of nowhere, [Hamilton] was not pushing at all.”
Formula 1’s Americas triple header continues next weekend with the Mexico City Grand Prix, with every session live on Sky Sports F1. Stream every F1 race and more with a NOW Sports Month Membership – No contract, cancel anytime