Toto Wolff Explains Why Lewis Hamilton Didn't Retire in Qatar
Dec 2, 2024 at 8:00 AM
Toto Wolff has made a significant decision regarding Lewis Hamilton's desire to retire the car in Qatar. This decision had far-reaching implications for Hamilton's race and the subsequent events in Abu Dhabi. Hamilton, starting from sixth place on the grid, faced a series of setbacks. A poor start saw him slip to ninth, and then he was slapped with a five-second time penalty for a false start. Apologizing to Mercedes, he moved just before the lights went out. But the evening took a more severe turn when he was given a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pit lane. Despite wanting to retire the car, his race engineer, Peter Bonnington, insisted they serve the penalty. Hamilton expressed his frustration, stating "Park the car mate. Retire the car." But Bonnington responded with "Negative." Hamilton then said "I'm switching off when I get there mate." Bonnington replied, "If you want a 5-second penalty in the next race then it's fine. We only have to do one more lap but we will drive through the pit lane." Hamilton served the penalty, bringing his car home in 12th place, over 20 seconds down on a points-paying position. Wolff admitted that even though it seemed senseless to continue, they had to take the penalty as it would have carried over into a grid penalty in Abu Dhabi. "The false start and the pit lane speeding, and it came to a point where it almost didn't make any sense to continue," Wolff said. "But if you park the car, you're carrying this five-second penalty into Abu Dhabi, and that's why we had to take it. The race was bad, and I think the car was super difficult for both of them to drive. It just didn't turn, when the grip kicks in the understeer, there's unbearable understeer. And both of them suffered from that." Analyzing the situation, Lewis Hamilton now has a chance to escape the ghosts of Abu Dhabi 2021. Adversary to hero, the die-hard Tifosi will have to adapt to his arrival. As for Hamilton, he admits the two penalties were his mistakes. "It was a pretty bad race for me overall, but these things happen," he said. "It started off badly with my false start which was my fault and resulted in a penalty which I served during my stop. I then had the puncture which was just unfortunate followed by the pit lane speeding which was on me, too." While hoping for a better outcome in Abu Dhabi where he'll say goodbye to Mercedes after 12 years together, he's not expecting a miracle ending. "I don't think we're going to end up in a high," he said. "It will end and I think what's important is how we turn up, we give it our best shot. I don't anticipate a particularly much better weekend than we've had in the past weekends, but naturally I'll try. Go in with low hopes and maybe come out with a better result – it doesn't really make a big difference either way. It's been a rollercoaster ride of emotions and I'm just grateful I'm still standing and I'm still OK. I've had great races in my life and I've had bad races in my life. Not too many bad ones."
