Lewis Hamilton recalls being ignored by Mercedes team: ‘You’re wrong’
Hamilton had endured a difficult two years with Mercedes, failing to win a race, and will join Ferrari in 2025
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Your support makes all the difference.Lewis Hamilton has detailed how his complaints over the last two years to his Mercedes team about their highly inconsistent car were ignored in the latest season of Drive to Survive.
Seven-time F1 world champion Hamilton has not won a race since December 2021, with the last two years hugely frustrating for the sport’s biggest star as he craves a record-breaking eighth title.
Mercedes opted for a unique “zero-sidepod” philosophy for the 2022 campaign, an approach they persisted with at the start of 2023, but lost massive ground to pace-setters Red Bull.
Last year was particularly difficult with Mercedes enduring their first winless campaign since 2011 and in season six of Netflix’s hit F1 docu-series, Hamilton explained how his initial concerns were swept away by the team.
“I remember complaining to the team and being like, ‘look we have to make these changes, otherwise this is the trajectory we’re going to go on and this is where we’re going to end up’,” he said.
“Please, please do something about it. I remember they said, ‘we know what we’re doing, you’re wrong’.
“And that was definitely an interesting moment. I was like, ‘okay, I’ll step back, don’t want to step on anybody’s toes.’
“Then when we got into the season, then we spoke again [they said] ‘oh, maybe you were right’.”
Hamilton has since decided to join Ferrari in 2025, with this year being his 12th and final season with Mercedes.
The 39-year-old has won six of his seven world championships with Mercedes; he claimed his first with McLaren in 2008.
Drive to Survive season 6 was released on 23 February on Netflix; the 2024 F1 season starts next Saturday, 2 March.
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