Tire wear MBZ and Hamilton

Regarding tire wear, there were other drivers who went 45+ laps on the intermediates notably Ocon, Kvyat, and Perez. Perez came in P2 but was 30 seconds behind Hamilton.

 

I think you nailed one of the key causes of Lewis' ability to go long on his tires in that he was racing, mostly unchallenged, at the front for much of his race. Clean air absolutely helps with tire life.

Another thing that helped Lewis was the track drying. Looking at the cars at race's end, he and others were racing on what were pretty much slicks. Had the rain kept up, those tires would have been terrible - but on a dry / nearly dry track they worked well.

I also think Lewis - like Perez - is generally good to his tires.

 

Because of the way they drive, some drivers are better than others in tyre (and brakes!) conservation.
It's all about fluidity, even if it's hardly visible from outside.

 

The third thing which really (REALLY)_ helped Hamilton is that, it appears, that intermediate tires actually worked on a wet race track and went a dozen laps without graining on the new track surface, whereas the people who pitted for a fresh set of intermediates after lap 40, had a devil of a time getting them up to temperature without graining.

Avoiding the second set of intermediates is what gave Lewis the race.

 

The track temp was very low. Switching to new inters meant getting the tyres up to temp again. Inablity to do so would cost heaps of time, and could easily mean losing the race. If Lewis had pitted, Perez would be very close behind him. If Lewis couldn't get the tyres on temp quickly, Perez would quite easily pass him.

Slicks weren't a real option as they have a higher operating temperatures.

As Joe said, there were several drivers that drove more than 45 laps on the tyre too, unnoticed by everyone...

 

LH was concerned that if he’d pitted, it would have been too wet and he may have crashed. He had a infinitesimally small margin for error.

 

Yes he said he was afraid of a china 2007 pitlane repeat, as entrance to the pitlane was quite wet I think in Turkey.

IIRC it wouldn't matter anyways as Bottas needed to score some points to keep the title fight alive, based on Hamilton not finishing the turkish GP and all the other next ones...and Bottas was far away from scoring points.

 

Not sure for this race, there was a comparison on television about an almost equally fast lap of Verstappen and Bottas.
They compared the race line of every corner.
In general Max had to drive at the edge of the track way more than Bottas did to just gain the same lap time.
Demanding more of his tyres, taking more risk.


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Awesome judgement from Lewis. It takes years for a driver to develop mentally, to gain decision making skills in the heat of the moment.

 

Only experience can give you that insight, and Hamilton has always learnt from his mistakes.

Racing is always more than raw speed, it's a whole package, and no one on the grid has it more than Hamilton.

 

Most drivers pitted several times for inters and I only saw one incident in the pit lane.

Give credit to the ones that pitted in a slippery pit lane and didn't do a 2007 Hamilton incident.

The door swings both ways gents.

 

https://www.gpblog.com/en/news/72993/mercedes-had-intermediate-tire-turned-into-slick-on-purpose.html