Lewis Hamilton believes Mercedes have found a way to increase their power unit’s performance for single flying laps in qualifying.
He likened the feature to the performance settings which became known as “party mode” when he previously drove for the team. Rules changes later limited how far teams could vary the performance of their power units.
Hamilton’s team mate Charles Leclerc headed Q1 today but Mercedes went on to take pole position. Their quickest lap was over half a second faster than their rivals, which Hamilton believes is down to their power unit.
“I was with Mercedes for a long, long time, so I know how it works there,” he said. “In qualifying they have another mode that they’re able to go to, a bit like a ‘party mode’ back in the day, and once they get to Q2 they switch that on, and we don’t have that, whatever that is.”
Ferrari’s deficit to Mercedes appears to be smaller in race trim. Before qualifying they ran close to eventual winner George Russell in the sprint race.
“In the race they obviously don’t have that mode,” Hamilton explained. “So they still obviously have an advantage overall.
“We’ve got to figure out what that is, there’s something more they’re able to extract, particularly in Q2. You see in Q1 we’re not that far away, and then all of a sudden it’s like a huge step. A tenth in Q1 behind, I think it was, and then all of a sudden it’s seven tenths or another half a second. It’s a big step.”
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However Hamilton believes Mercedes’ pace advantage in race trim is potentially as much as half a second per lap.
“We went into the [sprint] race knowing that they had a big advantage pace-wise, so I knew that [Russell] was going to come by at some point,” he said. “I was just trying to keep him at bay as much as I could, and in doing so my left-front [tyre] opened up because I had to push a lot harder.
“They’ve got a three-tenths to half-a-second advantage on us in pure race pace, I also believe, and that shows once they get in clear air, then they often pull away.”
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2026 Chinese Grand Prix
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