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Lewis Hamilton has a simple objective for the Turkish Grand Prix given he starts 11th. As he put it, it’s “to try and minimise the damage and get up as high as possible” – primarily in relation to title rival Max Verstappen.
The fact he’s in the fastest car around Istanbul Park, as proved by taking an illusory pole position in qualifying ahead of team-mate Valtteri Bottas, is a big positive, as are the memories of his famous recovery charge from 17th to second after a lap-two spin in the GP2 sprint race back in 2006.
He can also look to world championship rival Verstappen’s second place finish at Sochi from the back of the grid after a power unit change penalty two weeks ago for inspiration.
But Verstappen’s Russian Grand Prix could have gone very differently and represents a cautionary tale as much as an inspiration.
After all, he came close to sustaining front-wing damage when Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc turned across his bows at Sochi while battling with Sebastian Vettel, and relied on ground made up in the late-race rain and a well-timed switch to intermediates.
“I stayed out of trouble, worked my way through the field up until the point where I was in seventh and that looked like that was going to be the position for me,” said Verstappen of his race in Russia on Thursday.
“But then of course the chaos at the end with the rain made us finish second.”
Chaos can go both ways for Mercedes and Hamilton as safety car interventions, be they full-blown or virtual, and other incidents can make or break a race.
But Verstappen’s problem was that he eventually got stuck running seventh in the queue once Fernando Alonso passed him just after the Alpine driver made a pitstop.
This time Verstappen starts on the front row alongside Bottas on a difficult weekend for Red Bull. Verstappen didn’t offer an optimistic appraisal of his Sunday prospects and expects his title rival, who leads the world championship by two points, to get close to him in the race.
“They have a lot of pace this weekend, so I definitely expect them to be behind me at some point,” was Verstappen’s somewhat downbeat summary.
But where one title protagonist plays things down, so too does the other. Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff lamented on Saturday that “on the long runs at a certain stage we were behind a Haas and also a Williams and it was very difficult to even come close”.
It’s unlikely Hamilton will be behind either given a straightforward race, although a poor start, which we have seen from Mercedes at times, could conceivably mean he is. But he also feels that it’s no foregone conclusion that he will leap up the order to take a podium finish.
“It’s not the easiest, overtaking, at the moment,” said Hamilton. “And we are all on the same tyre as well, so I imagine it’s going to be difficult to move up.
“You saw it at the last race, what happened with Max for example once he got behind sixth place.
“I don’t know, but we have the long straight down the back and we will see what we can do and hopefully we can give the fans here a good race.”
The point about strategy is valid given that nine of the top 10 in qualifying, which includes Hamilton, set their Q2 times on mediums. That means there’s little variation on starting tyre in the top half of the field, save for AlphaTauri driver Yuki Tsunoda who starts on softs. However, there are question marks over tyre wear and the potential difficulty of a one-stop strategy.
Wolff has ruled out using Bottas as a rolling roadblock to help Hamilton’s cause and certainly that tactic would likely have little merit early on given it would simply create a DRS train where nobody is able to make progress.
That said, it’s possible to conceive of a scenario where Bottas might be able to be of value if he’s running ahead of Verstappen and Hamilton is able to get up to third – assuming, of course, pre-race favourite Bottas is able to hold onto his pole position advantage.
Given there’s no obvious strategic pathway to help Hamilton, save for that offered by a well-timed safety car, or red flag, it’s likely to be all about his wheel-to-wheel ability and the performance of the Mercedes in traffic. In clean air, the Mercedes has the pace, but can Hamilton find the space?
“It would would have been easier if we would have had a tyre offset strategy, but the hards in these conditions today would have been a little bit too bold,” said Wolff after qualifying.
“And therefore we expected that some of the other guys in front of us would run the soft in Q2, just to make sure that they are in the top 10 and that didn’t happen, which is a little bit of a setback.
“But it is what it is. He can only try to do the utmost and I wouldn’t want to have any other driver in the car when it is about overtaking and going through the field than Lewis.
“Having said that, yesterday we simulated some of these situations and it’s very difficult to follow in traffic, a phenomenon that we have already seen all year, but could be something that we need to fight tomorrow.
“There will be not many options left other than to try with strategy and obviously hope that the front train is not disappearing in the distance.”
Hamilton appeared to run with a little more rear wing than Bottas in qualifying, which seems a counter-intuitive approach given he is likely to need to do more overtaking.
While driver preference will have played a part, this should also help Hamilton look after the tyres when running in traffic when he needs to, while the increased power of the DRS effect relative to his team-mate should also serve him well when it comes to overtaking.
The wildcard in all of this is that while he does have Bottas up front and potentially in a position to help should Hamilton make enough progress to be a factor in the endgame up front, Verstappen has more allies.
Four of the 10 cars that start ahead of Hamilton are from the Red Bull stable, Verstappen, Sergio Perez (sixth) and AlphaTauri duo Pierre Gasly (fourth) and Tsunoda (ninth).
This effectively gives Verstappen a trio of wingmen who are motivated to make life difficult for Hamilton. There’s nothing wrong with that as they can all be expected to drive legitimately, but having them in play means there is the scope to make Hamilton’s life more difficult by covering his strategic moves while Verstappen concentrates on maximising his own result.
After all, Bottas himself spent significant time stuck behind Gasly at Sochi and was unable to pass so the three are all potential roadblocks.
For Hamilton’s part, he is hoping not to get stuck like Verstappen did for much of the second stint at Sochi and, if he does, then wet conditions could also prove to be his saviour.
“We had quite good balance,” said Hamilton of the car in race trim. “The track is very aggressive on the tyres, so it’ll be interesting to see how it works for everyone, tyre-wise – but getting past people is not going to be easy.
“You saw in the last race how difficult it was in the DRS train and no doubt it will be something similar tomorrow.
“But it’s a long race. I hope there’s some rain that comes along. It was actually surprising how fast the track is on wet tyres – probably faster than any other track we’ve been to in the wet.
“It’ll be interesting to see how that plays out tomorrow.”
The Hamilton/Mercedes combination undoubtedly has the pace. But the way the race unfolds, how incisive Hamilton can be in battle and strategy will dictate how effectively that speed can be deployed.
