While George Russell’s underweight car handed victory in the Belgian Grand Prix to Lewis Hamilton, it should take nothing away from the brilliance of his strategy and driving.
Russell’s bold call along with his pitwall in opting for an unlikely one-stop opened the door for what had looked like what was going to be a run to fifth place turning into a victory on the road.
It was also a win that served to leave team-mate Hamilton slightly annoyed after the race, as he suggested the one-stop route was never offered to him.
Speaking straight after the race to F1’s cameras, Hamilton said: “Every stint, I had tyres left, but the team pulled me in….”
Elaborating further later in the official press conference, Hamilton said that he would have been more than happy to carry on with his tyres during each of his stints – but each time the team intervened.
“I mean, if you listen [to the radio], you could have heard what I said to the team most of the time,” he said.
“But yeah, I think the tyres were pretty good. I still had plenty of tyres and I was going quicker. I didn’t want to stop.”
Hamilton’s tone hinted at things having not been totally equal between the two drivers, and that he did not have available to him a strategy option that his team-mate had managed to beat him with.
George Russell, Mercedes F1 W15, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes F1 W15
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
But from Mercedes’ perspective, the way that strategies played out with both drivers was the result of them being in slightly different circumstances, and the one-stop option for Russell only opened up because he was further down the order and there was less to lose.
Russell had been running fifth up to the first stops and, as the frontrunners all cycled through to their hards, it seemed that was where he was going to end up if he followed what everyone else was doing for the rest of the race.
There was so little pace difference between the cars, that making progress up the order was nigh on impossible.
But then, with the degradation on the hard looking to be minimal, and him having opened up a two-second advantage over Max Verstappen behind him prior to the second round of stops coming around, discussions began about whether or not he did need to stop again.
“It was quite back and forth over the course of three laps,” said Russell. “And I think it’s difficult because when you feel something in your gut, you have to go with it.
“But when every single driver and team is pitting to go on to a different alternative strategy, and after all the data we had on Friday suggested a one-stop was not even close to being viable, you do kind of question that a couple of times, thinking, ‘are we missing something here?’
“Like, why isn’t anybody else doing this? But, you know, I just sort of felt at one with the tyres and I managed it a little bit at the beginning, and I knew that would give me a bit of money back at the end.”
Eventually, as the others peeled in for the second and final stop, Russell found himself shuffled to the front and the fight was on to make it to the chequered flag.
From early leader Hamilton’s perspective, though, the way the race was panning out was different as he was facing bigger threats from behind.
Charles Leclerc had been well within undercut range through the first stage of the race, Oscar Piastri was making progress, and Mercedes was well aware by the time the second stops came around about how McLaren had paid the price with Lando Norris of going long early on, giving up track position, and getting trapped behind a slower car.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff later explained that, while Hamilton may have felt his tyres were in good condition at the end of each stint, the decision to pull the trigger and stop was all about him being able to maintain track position against Leclerc and Piastri who was nudging ever closer.
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes F1 W15
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
Wolff said: “As a driver, you don’t have the full picture because he said his tyres are good. But at that stage nobody had a one-stop on the radar. We had to cover the cars behind, I think it was Piastri and Leclerc. And you can see that everybody else went on the two-stop logically.
“It just wasn’t on the radar. So, what we did with Lewis was absolutely the right thing to do. But at the end, George made them survive.
“It couldn’t have been anticipated because if it would have been, any of the other top teams would have done it.”
When Mercedes made the strategy split, its data suggested that Russell had the possibility of finishing anywhere from first to fifth, so it was not the nailed-on best solution.
There was probably also an element of surprise about how much the dirty air made Hamilton’s life more difficult in being able to get past his team-mate at the end.
There is also the added element that Mercedes revealed afterwards that, if Piastri had been closer right at the end, and looked like becoming a real threat for the win, then it would have likely intervened and got Russell to move aside.
Asked if there was a temptation to order a position swap, Wolff said: “Not with team orders but probably if we had one more lap, that could have been a consideration because it would have protected P1, and George would have finished P3. But I’m happy that we didn’t have to make this call.”
But as Hamilton reflects on how things ultimately played out, it is probably not lost on him now that if it is confirmed that Russell’s unexpected one stop triggered an extra degree of wear that proved decisive in making his car underweight, then he escaped something much worse by sticking to the original strategy plan, even if he was slightly annoyed at the time.
