Mercedes F1 confirms Hamilton’s puncture wasn’t caused by mirror debris, offering early insights while Pirelli continues its tire investigations.
The puncture that struck Lewis Hamilton during the Qatar Grand Prix was not caused by debris scattered when Valtteri Bottas hit a mirror, according to Mercedes F1.
Hamilton was one of two drivers who suffered punctures around the same time Bottas hit the mirror that had fallen off Alexander Albon’s car. Race control initially displayed yellow flags in response to the mirror but later withdrew them without retrieving the debris.
F1 race director Rui Marques faced criticism from some for not deploying the virtual safety car or the safety car to allow marshals to recover the debris. The FIA explained its decision earlier this week.
Andrew Shovlin, Mercedes’ track engineering director, revealed that the team’s inspection of Hamilton’s damaged front-left tire indicated that the debris from Bottas hitting the mirror did not cause the failure.
“We obviously have the video data, and we can see exactly when the mirror detached and when it broke into several pieces. We also have the onboard data, and we measure tire pressure in real time.”
“Surprisingly, we could see Lewis starting to lose pressure before Valtteri hit the mirror. So we would say it’s unlikely that the puncture was caused by debris. That’s certainly what we thought at the time, as both events seemed almost simultaneous.”
Pirelli admitted that it would need to investigate further to determine whether the tires were simply overworked by the teams on the demanding Losail circuit.
A video of Sainz’s car also showed that his tire failed before he reached the field of debris scattered when Bottas hit the mirror.
Although the broken mirror does not appear to have caused Hamilton’s puncture, the possibility that another piece of debris triggered the failure cannot be ruled out, according to Shovlin.
“This doesn’t mean he didn’t pick up debris elsewhere, but we need to wait for Pirelli to conduct its analysis and complete its investigations. They are doing many detailed checks on all the tires, trying to understand if there is any deterioration.”
Hamilton reported the puncture on lap 34. Prior to the race, Pirelli had advised drivers not to exceed the 25th lap with a set of medium tires before changing them.
“A huge amount of load goes through the front-left tire in Qatar. There were also chunks of tire wearing down quite heavily, and again, this is related to the fact that you have these very high-speed corners taken flat out at nearly 300 km/h. So once we have that analysis, we’ll know a bit more.”
- Discover More>Tsunoda: “I Deserve a Chance at Red Bull”
- Follow us on >Facebook and >Twitter for F1 updates.
Mercedes F1 Reveals Initial Findings on Hamilton’s Puncture Mercedes F1 Reveals Initial Findings on Hamilton’s Puncture
