Lewis Hamilton’s irate immediate post-race comments that “they’re trying to stop me” in reaction to his controversial time penalties in the Russian Grand Prix capped a couple of hours that were not the world champion’s finest.
Hamilton has a supreme ability to manage pressure. Even when something gets under his skin, he tends to rise above it and do what he needs to do. But he also has a tendency to slip into sustained complaining during the race, and can be quick to propagate a ‘me against the world’ mentality off-track too.
At its best this is the tenacity that drives him to glory. At his worst it is the stubbornness that some view as petulance
His radio irritation, which came to the fore at Sochi, is a long-established venting mechanism that usually works in Hamilton’s favour. It’s the equivalent of a tennis player screaming on court after an error, or a footballer yelling in anguish after missing a good chance to score. Pent-up frustration is no good in elite sport.
But the release can come across badly to those watching, especially when it’s in the form of driver-team radio exchanges. That is partly the nature of snippets that are played without full context, partly because the worse the frustration the sulkier Hamilton sounds. This is further underlined when Hamilton is in a gloomy mood post-race, and throws a couple of jabs in the direction of the rulemakers.
That’s not to say it isn’t understandable when he feels he’s unjustly lost a race victory. And remember he felt Mercedes had been targeted already by in-season rule change around engine modes in qualifying, so the ‘them against us’ mentality put down roots a few weeks ago.
Critics point to a persecution complex but his suspicions and concerns at least stem from real actions, even if the motives are not necessarily as nefarious as assumed.
Hamilton had a poor race. He was angry with the stewards for the decision and made that very clear. But he also questioned Mercedes on at least two occasions about why he had to take the penalty when he did and why he stopped when he did, requiring what he felt was an unnecessarily long second stint as he wanted to run the soft tyres a little longer.
After the race, Hamilton came out swinging in the direction of the officials. To those who don’t sympathise with Hamilton’s position, he probably just comes across a sore loser.
What we heard and saw at Sochi was an extreme manifestation of Hamilton’s most divisive trait: his intensity. At its best it is the tenacity that drives him and Mercedes to glory. At his worst it is the stubbornness that some view as petulance.
Hamilton constantly questions problems in the moment, whether he’s facing a real challenge, a potential one or an imaginary one (a worry that’s in his head that he cannot shake).
He seemed downtrodden in his “I don’t want any more info Bono, it doesn’t make a difference” message
It often appears that Hamilton is trying to rationalise things in real-time. Am I on the best strategy? How hard is this going to be? What concerns do I have? Are there alternative options? And he cycles through those thoughts with engineer Peter ‘Bono’ Bonnington, who plays the dual role of race engineer and therapist.
The answers Hamilton gets to his questions determine whether his concerns are allayed, he’s fired up to overcome the obstacles that are there, or he’s distracted and unmotivated because he thinks everything’s going against him. And they inform how he responds as well: is he on the team’s side or challenging them further?
Mercedes expects this, accepts it, and embraces it because it’s usually a benefit. Mercedes’ top brass – Toto Wolff, James Allison, Andy Cowell – have all talked before about Hamilton’s inquisitive, tenacious, relentless nature. Hamilton is renowned for ‘good enough’ not being good enough. He cannot therefore be expected to easily accept something that goes against him. Such a trait can be managed in most circumstances but it’s not a tap that can be turned off and on.
At Sochi, the weight of the difficulties prompted the worst kind of response. Hamilton complained about the race strategy at length, but once that was dropped his head seemed to go with it.
This is very rare with Hamilton, but it does happen. He seemed downtrodden in his “I don’t want any more info Bono, it doesn’t make a difference” message early in his second stint when being given lap times of his immediate rivals. A silent in-lap where he said nothing over the radio made it clear how dissatisfied he was.
How Hamilton handled his setbacks in the Russian GP drew comparisons with Daniel Ricciardo, who had a much more civil response to being handed a five-second time penalty for a track limits offence while passing Renault team-mate Esteban Ocon.
Ricciardo’s radio temperament compared to Hamilton’s is certainly indicative of their fundamentally different personalities. The Aussie is a more relaxed character and that comes across very well, especially in soundbite form. He’s determined and relentless in a different way to Hamilton. Their fires come from different places.
“It lit a bit of a fire under my bum, and I just got on with it” :: Daniel Ricciardo
So, as a rule, Ricciardo and Hamilton often occupy different places on a spectrum of disposition. They are likely to respond to the same setback in different ways. But it’s important to acknowledge there’s actually very little similar of substance between the two Sochi incidents, beyond ‘both drivers had time penalties’.
“I took full responsibility for it,” said Ricciardo afterwards. “I just locked up and went wide, and I was like, ‘I’m probably going to get a penalty here’. So, when they told me I think I’d already accepted it in my head.”
This is significant, because the context of their infringements were completely different. Ricciardo knew he was bang to rights with an offence that’s well-established and has plenty of precedent. Hamilton felt hard done by because he was convinced he wasn’t in the wrong and there was no frame of reference to judge.
Another important piece of context is what it meant for their respective races, and what they were fighting for. Hamilton was removed from the lead, dropped to third, and was several seconds behind with older tyres. His race was effectively irreparably compromised.
But Ricciardo’s wasn’t. He still had track position and the tools to fight his immediate rivals, and knew that “the only way to eliminate the penalty is to go faster, and build a gap to [Charles] Leclerc behind me”.
“So it was actually quite good in hindsight, it lit a bit of a fire under my bum, and I just got on with it,” said Ricciardo.
“That was cool. I was, I guess, proud to not let it get to me, and I think we made a really good race of it after that.”
Hamilton was complaining. He sounded petulant. Maybe in the moment he was. But frustration in the heat of battle can make anyone look bad
Context is key to the narrative of a driver’s race which is why it’s important not to let radio snapshots form too solid an opinion in the moment. Snippets played out on the world feed are done to maximise their impact and are presented without full context either.
That shouldn’t be read as a defence of Hamilton, or to say how he talks or acts is the right thing to do all the time. It’s certainly not an argument either that Hamilton comes across well or is misrepresented, more just a reminder that all bite-size radio messages do is represent the speaker in a very specific moment.
Hamilton was complaining. He sounded petulant. Maybe in the moment he was.
But frustration in the heat of battle can make anyone look bad, especially when the driver has a trait that lends itself to tipping them over the edge. That doesn’t stop what we saw or heard from Hamilton being the worst manifestation of that trait. It just makes it understandable.
It means it’s not, or shouldn’t be, a fundamental denunciation of his character. Hamilton would be a poorer all-round person without the intensity that underpins the positive and negative attributes he has as a driver and the determination he has in not being silenced in promoting his anti-racism pursuits – where a ‘them against us’ mindset is hardly misplaced. Hamilton is wired to challenge perceived injustices, whatever their level.
It’s also important to note that the climb-downs from his peaks of frustration are as important as the outbursts themselves, because that’s when he is able to talk through his feelings. And for all the attention around his initial suggestions of bias, Hamilton had softened his stance shortly afterwards.
He was asked in the press conference if he felt targeted, and said: “I don’t necessarily think that it’s for me, I think whenever a team is at the front, obviously they are doing a lot of scrutiny.
“They are changing rules, such as the engine regs [the recent engine mode directive], lots of things to get in the way to keep the racing exciting, I assume.
“I don’t know if [what happened at Sochi] was anything to do with it but naturally that’s how it feels. It feels like we’re fighting uphill.
“But it’s OK, it’s not like I haven’t faced adversity before.”
Hamilton’s conclusion was that he and Mercedes need to get their head down, and be “squeaky clean” from now on.
He will proceed to become a seven-time world champion and break Michael Schumacher’s win record. And he’ll continue to have moments where he’s a radio menace, or locks horns with adversaries, because for however long Hamilton has the intensity that’s about to make him the most successful driver in F1 history there will be friction that accompanies it.
