What Lewis Hamilton Needs To Do In 2023 Spanish GP

Lewis Hamilton, frankly speaking, needs a strong result at the forthcoming Spanish Grand Prix of 2023. And that’s not only because where it stands at present, then the winner of the 2020 World Championship is currently fourth on the F1 driver standings with 69 points to his name.

Why Hamilton must bounce back strongly at the fast approaching race weekend at Catalonia is simply down to the fact that he missed making any impactful presence in 2022, this being at a venue where he has been quite successful in the past.

So what really happened at the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix.

Given that the primary constraint he faced was on account of the uncomfortable aerodynamic woe called porpoising, all that Lewis Hamilton could manage, firstly in the qualifying of the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix was a lowly P6.

However, it would not indicate that his performances in the main race would change any drastically; all that the Stevenage-born driver was able to drive home at the completion of the 66-lap long race was a fifth place finish. In so doing, while he trailed the local favourite, Carlos Sainz Jr., the Ferrari driver finishing on a respectable- if not tremendous- fourth, Hamilton was only able to outperform the Alfa Romeo of Valtteri Bottas and the Alpines of Ocon and Alonso.

That he kept the nose of his Mercedes ahead of the Alpha Tauri of Yuki Tsunoda, the Japanese grabbing a tenth, was perhaps no mighty achievement.

The Lewis Hamilton of 2023 at Spain may want to draw inspiration from the 2021 driver

But this year on, what Lewis Hamilton truly needs, the intrepid F1 observers may note, is some sort of performance that can match his 2021 Spanish GP heroics.

After all, the 2021 Spanish GP was a race that transpired during the peak Verstappen versus Hamilton rivalry, one where in front of the indomitable might of the great Briton, Verstappen, winner of the 2022 race, was made to eat humble pie.

Hamilton, two years back in the day, was on the very track where he’s bound to race once again, simply unstoppable.

As a matter of fact, it serves well to refresh one’s memory, then it’s great to note that back in 2021, Lewis Hamilton nearly led every single lap of the Spanish Grand Prix and won the contest from pole position (1:16:741).

With a 1:18:149, Max Verstappen set the fastest lap of the day and wasn’t that far behind his then arch-rival; the Dutchman finishing on second.

But two years have passed since the utterly competitive race weekend at the fast charger of a track that’s Barcelona, the home race for not just Carlos Sainz Jr., but also that of his racing idol: Fernando Alonso.

In such time, Hamilton’s problems have increased somewhat and do not only concern themselves with Russell, the attacking teammate who’s ready to go full throttle, now that Valtteri Bottas has moved to Alfa Romeo.

What Hamilton, it’s not that hard to note, had back then was an express fast machine on the track. What he has now is a car whose best races, or so it seems, still lie somewhere in the distant future.

While Mercedes are hoping to find the actual result here in Spain from the upgrades they had originally brought out in Monaco, Hamilton, on his part, has simply played down the hype.

But what can’t really be hyped or elaborated any further is just how dominant Lewis Hamilton has been here at the Spanish Grand Prix in the past having won the famed F1 event on six separate occasions.

As a matter of fact, Lewis Hamilton, who’d be absolutely delighted in bouncing back strong here in 2023, won the Barcelona-bound Grand Prix consistently from the onset of 2017 until the completion of 2021.

That makes him the only driver to have done so at Spain as far as the current grid is concerned.