The 2022 Formula 1 season will not be easy for Lewis Hamilton and for the Mercedes team, which is now struggling to contend every inch with Ferrari and Red Bull cars. In any case, the seven-time world champion was pleased with the performance he achieved this Saturday in qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix, where he finished fifth, although he expressed his disapproval of new design of single-seater.

“Compared to yesterday and the last race, today has been a good day for me. I am very grateful to everyone at the factory for the work they did in replacing the car yesterday. I almost achieved fourth place, something that would have been great, although I think we will fight for that place tomorrow ”, excited the Briton, who finished 13th in free practice on Friday.

This Saturday at Melbourne’s Albert Park, the greatest winner in Formula 1 history (with 103 wins) recorded a time of 1: 18.825 on his best lap of the 5,278-meter track and was 957 thousandths behind the poleman, the Monegasque Charles Leclerc (Ferrari). On Sunday he will start in the third row with his teammate and compatriot George Russell.

“I think we’ve done a good job to get to where we are, because yesterday we had a bigger deficit. I am naturally happy with it ”, celebrated Hamilton, considering that in this third test of the year he will have the chances to fight for a podium. “I’ll just fight as much as I can, I’ll try to get to the finish line as much as possible,” he explained.

Despite the progress this Saturday, the Englishman reiterated his disapproval of the vehicle design changes implemented this season. “I dare say that the new era of these cars is the worst I’ve experienced in terms of porposing (the jumps the car makes, especially when driving at very high speeds),” he said.

And he details: “If the ride height is high / low, high / low, when you turn you don’t know what position you’re going to take on the curve and the car can oversteer or understeer, depending on which you’ll get it. So driving becomes more and more of a challenge. ” “We need to find the right height balance to make the most of it as we control the jumps tomorrow,” he warns.

Both complaints were expressed by George Russell after his sixth place in the standings. “I think we were still studying, trying to understand the car. It wasn’t perfect, it bounced hard and limited us to fast corners. That’s where I lost all my time,” the 24-year-old explained. .

However, Russell, who finished fourth in Bahrain and fifth in Saudi Arabia, is confident of repeating a task that will allow him to crack the top five in Sunday’s competition, although he also expressed surprise. in the performance of Lando Norris, who achieved fourth place. in qualification.

“It’s kind of surprising to catch up with one of the McLarens, which seems to be very fast this weekend. With a little bit of fuel, I think, we should be faster than them. There’s no reason why we can’t finish ahead of the McLarens. If it’s going to be okay all in all, we can aim for fourth or fifth place, but it probably won’t be that easy, ”he said.