In their debut year as Mercedes teammates in 2022, George Russell outperformed Lewis Hamilton. But does that imply that the fresher British racer performed better than his seven-time World Champion teammate?
It is simple to draw the conclusion that George Russell had the measure of Lewis Hamilton’s capabilities at Mercedes based on the season data from 2022.
Hamilton did not place first; but Russell did. Hamilton missed the lead, whereas Russell did. Hamilton came in 6th with 240 points, while Russell took fourth place with 275 points, according to the Drivers’ Championship.
Although Russell ended ahead of Hamilton on multiple occasions in 2022, Russell’s advantage was primarily in the first half of the season, which goes to show that stats only tell part of the story. The tide started to turn in Hamilton’s favor during the rest of the year.
HAMILTON VS. RUSSELL 2022
| Statistics | Hamilton | Russell |
|---|---|---|
| Highest qualifying position | 13 | 9 |
| Highest race finish | 10 | 12 |
| Wins (not including Sprint races) | 0 | 1 |
| Pole positions | 0 | 2 |
| Podiums | 9 | 8 |
| Points | 240 | 275 |
| Retirements | 2 | 1 |
| Final Championship position | 6th | 4th |
The challenging task for Hamilton
With their latest W13, Mercedes had a challenging start to 2022. Some people claimed that the squad was sandbagging and hiding their actual speed during winter testing because of some poor results, as they had previously done.
It soon became clear, though, that this was not the case and that Mercedes was actually having trouble getting the best of the car.
The W13 struggled greatly with porpoising and bouncing in the early part of the season, leaving Mercedes playing catch-up with the top teams as they attempted to comprehend their troubles. An innovative sidepod-less concept design found eye-catching, but it failed to meet expectations the expected performance gains.
Hamilton was therefore sent out on the racetrack with severe setups in an attempt to comprehend the limits of the car and its optimal operating window, particularly in the first half of the season.
The deliberate risk of doing so was that Russell, whose W13 frequently had a more conservative set-up, would be faster than the seven-time World Champion.
By Baku’s eighth race of the 2022 season, Russell had three podium places to Hamilton’s one and was ahead of his teammate 99 to 62 in the Drivers’ rankings.
Hamilton was the obvious choice for this test project given his 15 years of F1 experience and seven World Championship victories. He is the expert on what goes into a winning car. Simply put, Russell lacks that kind of experience, particularly in Formula 1.
Hamilton no longer needed to adopt experimental changes as Mercedes’ W13 revisions and modifications began to show results. Instead, the seven-time World Champion started to express himself more, winning nine out of the 14 races starting in Canada.
Does this affect Russell’s performance? No, definitely not. After spending three years driving an unsatisfactory Williams, the younger British driver performed admirably in his first season in a strong car, earning his first Grand Prix and showing his ability to compete at the front of the grid.
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F1, F1 2022, FIA, Formula 1, Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, George Russell, Toto Wolff