The puncture which struck Lewis Hamilton during the Qatar Grand Prix was not caused by the debris scattered when Valtteri Bottas hit a wing mirror, Mercedes believes.
Hamilton was one of two drivers who suffered punctures around the same time Bottas hit the mirror, which had fallen off Alexander Albon’s car. Race control initially issued yellow flags in reaction to the mirror but withdrew them without it being recovered.FIA F1 race director Rui Marques was criticised by some for his decision not to use a Virtual Safety Car or Safety Car so marshals could recover the debris. The FIA explained his decision earlier this week.
Now Mercedes‘ head of trackside engineering Andrew Shovlin has revealed the team’s inspection of Hamilton’s damaged front-left tyre indicates the debris scattered when Bottas hit the mirror did not cause it to fail.
“We’ve obviously got the video data, we can see exactly when that mirror got smashed, when it got broken into a lot of pieces,” said Shovlin in a video published by the team. “We’ve also got the on-car data and we’re measuring the pressure in the tyres live.
“Now, surprisingly, we can see Lewis start to lose pressure prior to the mirror being hit by Valtteri. So from that we would say it’s unlikely that it was a debris puncture. That was certainly what we thought at the time because the two appeared to be almost simultaneous.”
Although the broken mirror does not appear to have caused Hamilton’s puncture, the possibility some other piece of debris triggered the failure cannot be ruled out, said Shovlin.
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“It doesn’t mean that he didn’t pick up some debris elsewhere, but we need to wait for [F1’s official tyre supplier] Pirelli to do their analysis and their investigations,” he said. “They’ll do a lot of detailed checks on all the tyres, trying to understand if there’s any deterioration.”
Hamilton was on lap 34 when he reported the puncture. Before the race Pirelli suggested drivers would go not further than lap 25 on a set of medium tyres before changing them.
“A huge amount of load goes through the front-left around Qatar, said Shovlin. “There were also bits of the tyre that were wearing quite heavily and again that’s linked to the fact that you’ve got these super fast corners that are flat out at nearly 300kph. So once we get that analysis, we will understand a bit more.”
Video from Sainz’s car also indicated his tyre failed before he reached the debris field which was scattered when Bottas struck the mirror.
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2024 Qatar Grand Prix
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An Sionnach
4th December 2024, 22:54
Good. Sounds like the neither the race director following the rules nor the rules themselves caused an issue. No need to wave red flags for every little thing…
amped
4th December 2024, 23:30
I’m not exactly sure either Hamilton’s or Sainz’s puncture were. It would have been the right side wheels (from the driver’s perspective) that would have potentially drove over the debris field.
I wonder if it was caused by dipping worn tyres into the gravel too many times?
roadrunner (@roadrunner)
5th December 2024, 8:57
Me neither. I just watched the replay of the incident. Leclerc passes Bottas who than hit the mirror. A few seconds later Sainz arrived already sparking more than usual it seems. It kind of looks like a slow puncture that manifested itself later around the lap.
Jojo
5th December 2024, 11:07
It’s the kurbs at Qatar cause more damage to the front left. Already most of the drivers were running the medium beyond what Pirelli recommended. I dare say there would have been several more punctures within the next couple of laps if everyone hadn’t pitted at that point.
lynn-m
5th December 2024, 0:23
so potentially another example of the pirelli tires failing without warning or much performance loss due to been run too long even though they were well within pirelli’s guidelines on stint length.
the past decade pirelli have had to be the worst tire supplier in the history of F1 as never before has there been so many tire issues and in the past if there was then at least teams had the option of switching to another/better supplier.
but pirelli have to be kept around as they are the only tire supplier willing to make tires designed for the show rather than for pure performance which is what things used to be about back when F1 was a sport rather than a contrived show.
Carl Parker (@mysticarl)
5th December 2024, 11:46
In the article the stint length expected by Pirelli was 25 laps – lap of puncture was 34, so 9 laps past expected stop time.
Crawliin-from-the-wreckage- Special Unhinged Edition (@davedai)
5th December 2024, 1:18
RD and Marshall’s aside
My main source of discomfiture is that a piece of a car fell off completely unaided.
Given the recent number of “rebuilds” recently, for that team, I’d have liked to have seen that one black flagged. And the other also out of “an abundance of caution”.
Craig
5th December 2024, 11:50
It’s not the first time and likely won’t be the last a mirror has fallen off a car. It may have been weakened by his run in with Stroll for all we know.
Crawliin-from-the-wreckage- Special Unhinged Edition (@davedai)
5th December 2024, 22:53
Yes and that makes it OK how?
Been around this “show” almost 60 years now. Supposed to get better.
Tens of millions spent and bits fall off.
Meh happened before doesn’t cut it.
Remember about another failure?
“I accept some responsibility but not culpability”. A. Newry
Or pick any Chapman moment, car built to last “til the end and not a moment more” and just carry on with bandaids which is probably what WRacing used.
cdavman (@cdavman)
5th December 2024, 7:44
Given that an entire mirror fell off the Williams, I wouldn’t be surprised to find it had also shed parts elsewhere round the track too.
Crawliin-from-the-wreckage- Special Unhinged Edition (@davedai)
5th December 2024, 22:58
Wouldn’t be surprised. Perhaps James has his mind on higher things
Like DeLorean Mk. II
Stephen Crowsen (@drycrust)
5th December 2024, 8:51
It sounds like the tyre pressure monitoring systems aren’t synchronised with video.
Carl Parker (@mysticarl)
5th December 2024, 11:55
It must have been awfully close to simultaneous given they’d have pitted him if there was an issue before the s/f straight – maybe they’d not accounted for their video feed delay at the time of interview, but I’d be astonished if both punctures weren’t down to the mirror debris. Carlos was sparking on the straight but not in an unusual way, just the normal amount and he made T1 fine so I doubt his was pre-mirror either.
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
5th December 2024, 13:14
Mercedes should focus on keeping pit stops under 7 seconds.
JMDan (@danmar)
5th December 2024, 15:00
Where do they find F1 officials these days?
sandy
6th December 2024, 0:23
when FIA pressure teams to spout some nonsense to save face.