Lewis Hamilton lacks the technical nous that helped to make Michael Schumacher so successful in Formula 1, according to an engineer who worked with the Briton.
Hamilton and Schumacher are inarguably the two most successful drivers in the history of the sport. They evenly share 14 world championship trophies between them, along with almost 200 race wins and dozens of other records.
Schumacher had difficult periods during his career, and Hamilton is experiencing one of those at the moment as he struggles to get to grips with a temperamental Mercedes car this season. With the Briton 75 points adrift of the championship leader Max Verstappen and being outshone by new team-mate George Russell, one engineer believes his unease is contributing to his struggles.
"Lewis needs to have confidence in the car, which is very important to him," said Philipp Brandle, as per speedweek.com , who worked with Hamilton as an aerodynamicist at Mercedes for six years. "He's not like [Michael] Schumacher and doesn't have the technical background. But he can feel the car particularly well."
A fifth-placed finish in Spain gave hope of improvements, but the car's performance in Monaco last time out gave the impression that it had been something of a false dawn. He was almost a minute adrift of the leaders while Russell had been just 11 seconds behind by the end of the race – though he wasn't helped by being stuck behind an ambling Fernando Alonso for a large period.
But it was the layout of the infamous Monaco street circuit which "highlighted the weaknesses" of the Mercedes cars, according to the team's trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin. "It's been a frustrating weekend for the team and drivers," he wrote after the race. "We weren't anywhere near quick enough on one lap but even in the race we didn’t have enough pace.
"George did a good job to take P5 from Lando on the dry transition and also to hold him behind at the end of the race – luckily, he was only there for one lap. Lewis had a tough time sandwiched between the Alpines for most of the race – we just couldn't find a way of putting him in free air without him needing to overtake which is near impossible.
"It also seemed that the cold conditions were making life quite difficult for the tyres and both our cars dropped off towards the end of the race. We've clearly got work to do ahead of Baku as there are a lot of similarities between the cornering sections and this track has highlighted our weaknesses."
