Lewis Hamilton copied Fernando Alonso trick to manage Mercedes issue in Azerbaijan Grand Prix

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Lewis Hamilton has revealed he had to copy a trick Fernando Alonso became admired for to manage a frustrating issue with his Mercedes W15 in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The 39-year-old largely bore a vexing time in Baku last weekend as Hamilton watched his teammate George Russell lead Mercedes’ efforts. After being the Silver Arrows’ top driver in practice on Friday, the momentum moved to the other half of their garage before qualifying.

While Russell put his W15 fifth in the Q3 leaderboard, Hamilton would only manage P7 with a 0.415s deficit. Mercedes and the Briton then agreed that he would start the Azerbaijan GP from the pit lane after installing a fifth power unit of the year which exceeded his allowance.

Hamilton managed to recover a points-scoring finish from the pit lane, but would only claim P9 when Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz crashed on the penultimate lap of the Azerbaijan GP. The Red Bull and Ferrari pair colliding also promoted Russell onto the podium in third place.

Lewis Hamilton copied Fernando Alonso’s driving style in the F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix

Progress was slow for Hamilton in the Azerbaijan GP as the seven-time Formula 1 champion came through the field. He regularly struggled to make up places from the pit lane owing to the Mercedes star overheating his tyres whenever stuck behind other cars on Baku’s streets.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff even called Hamilton’s Azerbaijan GP a ‘horror race’ at the chequered flag, and later deemed it a ‘race of misery’. The Briton would likely have not scored points without him overtaking Nico Hulkenberg once clear of Perez and Sainz’s crash.

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Hamilton also notes his Azerbaijan GP was such a miserable affair after having to manage a mishandling Mercedes for 51 laps around Baku. The amount of understeer his W15 offered even forced Hamilton to replicate how Alonso won his drivers’ titles back in 2005 and 2006.

“It had so much understeer that instead of going smoothly, I had to swerve to make it slide in all the corners because it didn’t go in as it should,” Hamilton noted, via quotes by Marca.

“You remember Fernando Alonso at the time when he was winning his championships? This is the driving style I have had to apply.”

Lewis Hamilton has a rear-focused driving style compared to Fernando Alonso’s front-favoured

Alonso became revered among Formula 1 fans whilst driving for Renault in the early-2000s as the Spaniard was a relentlessly aggressive driver. He would attack every corner at a time when the Michelin tyres on his Renault could handle being pushed to their limits every lap.

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Compared to his rivals like Jenson Button who was known for having a smooth driving style, Alonso chucked his Renault into corners with lots of speed and applied full lock as soon as he turned in. It meant the front end of his cars attacked corners and the rear end followed.

While Hamilton also has a rather aggressive driving style, the Mercedes star’s approach has seldom been like what Alonso’s once was. The Briton largely asks the rear end of his cars to do most of the turning and seeks as much of the aero load as possible on the rear end, too.