Hamilton gives insight into qualifying woes

02/09/2012

After a disappointing qualifying session which saw him vent his dismay on Twitter, Lewis Hamilton has returned to the social networking tool to further demonstrate his point.

Posting a photo of some of the team's telemetry, Hamilton's shared an overlay of his fastest lap against that of teammate and pole-sitter Jenson Button.

"In engineering, just been shown this, overlay of mine & jensons qualifying lap on a speed trace. This is what I was trying to explain yesterday," Hamilton Tweeted.

Hamilton had complained yesterday that he'd lost four tenths of a second to teammate Button on a straight alone, the result of opting for a higher downforce rear wing. It was a decision that ultimately backfired, as supported by the telemetry.

It's a fascinating insight in to the level of detail Formula One teams go in to, and appropriately comes from Hamilton after he hurriedly deleted a Tweet yesterday lamenting the fact he'd chosen the wrong setup for qualifying.

Interestingly the data shows not only a direct comparison between the driver's speed at any given point, but also the relative lap time. Displayed as a red dotted line it shows that Hamilton was a tenth down heading in to Eau Rouge, though with greater downforce clawed that time back.

From there however Hamilton's lap begins to unravel, losing six tenths of a second on the run from Eau Rouge to Les Combes. While the 2008 world champion regains those losses and more he loses a further half second from Stavelot to the Bus Stop chicane.

Reacting to the post, which was subsequently delated, former F1 racer, Alex Wurz, now a driver coach at williams, Tweeted: "Could you also tweet the race strategy and set up sheet. Thanks mate."