Hamilton Compares Dominant Red Bull To His Own Legendary W11

Posted on December 3, 2023 | by Dre Harrison It’s hard not to have at least some degree of respect for Red Bull pulling off arguably the greatest F1 season ever achieved in 2023. Even their fellow competitors were tipping the hat to them, including the last man to hold a vicegrip on the sport, Lewis Hamilton! Lewis has had many a dominant car in F1 himself, one of them being the Mercedes W11, a fan favourite and possibly the best car Lewis had in his run of dominance.  Lewis won six world championships in seven years between 2014 and 2020, but the W11 of 2020 was arguably his best car. With it, Lewis won 11 times in the 16 races he took part in that season, only finishing off the podium twice and winning the championship over teammate Valtteri Bottas by 124 points. In a sit-down interview with a small group of journalist including The Race’s Mark Hughes, Lewis talked about the comparisons between that car and the Red Bull RB19 from when he got a glimpse of it, including that famous Austin chase down where Lewis nearly won before being disqualified for an illegal plank. “You watch the Red Bull and it does everything well. It looks very similar to my 2020 car, characteristic-wise.”, said Lewis. “Super-stable. They are firing on all cylinders.” “It looks like it’s in that kind of window like we used to have, which for a driver is a dream because then you can really extract your own personal abilities to the max. I don’t think we have ever really truly pushed them… maybe Austin we were the closest but even then I think they still always had a tenth or two on us at the bare minimum.” Lewis could certainly relate to the controlled dominance that he thinks Max exhibited over the course of the season.  “You go through lap times and some of the data from Max, and you can see he is chilling at the front more often than not,” continued Lewis. “I don’t think he has broken a sweat during the year. “I think he was just able to control it and when you are in that position when you have performance and can back off, the tyres go longer and you are in a sweet spot and it’s amazing to be in that place.” Certainly a tip of the cap towards Max’s dominance from the seven-time world champion! Do you think Max was coasting at times during 2023?