Mercedes change Lewis Hamiltons wheel after Virtual Safety Car confusion
F1 News
Mercedes have revealed that they will make some changes to Lewis Hamiltons' dash display after he lost time to his teammate during the Virtual Saftey Car period of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. It has been reported that Hamilton lost sight of the required delta time.
Mercedes chief strategist James Vowles explained that Hamilton had an issue and that the team would try and fix it.
"During the VSC at the end of the race, you would've seen Lewis lose a couple of seconds of race time relative to Valtteri, which could've been crucial to the win," Vowles explained to Autosport.
"When the VSC ends, the driver gets a notification on his screen on his dash and that's something that we have the ability to control - what's displayed and what's not.
"We asked Lewis to do a number of switch changes, which is normal to put the car into a [better] performant mode. But, with every change he lost sight of what that delta time was.
"The other factor that was contributing here was that if you are in a straight line, for example Turn 16, [or] long straight, and the VSC ends all you have to do is manage the throttle and get on throttle and go straight.
"But, Lewis wasn't. He was in a braking zone for a VSC, one of the most difficult situations because now it is very difficult to modulate where you are on the delta time and get ready for the VSC restart.
"We, from our side, can do some more work to make that certainly better in terms of a dash display going forward into Barcelona and we will do."