Hamilton “had a couple of really big moments” due to unstable rear end

Lewis Hamilton is seeking a more stable rear end on his Mercedes after struggling to control his W15 through the quickest corners at Jeddah Corniche Circuit.

The Mercedes driver said he had “a difficult day” of practice for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. “I’m just lacking confidence in the rear of the car, in the set-up,” he explained.

“We did some work from session to session, changed the car quite a bit. But the underlying issue is the rear end that I was struggling with.

“So I had a couple of really big moments out there. In these high-speed areas you need to have full faith that there is a car and I’ve just not got that yet.”

Hamilton and George Russell experimented with different set-ups over the two hour-long practice sessions. Russell ended the day second on the times sheets, two-tenths of a second off the pace.

“George is obviously a lot happier with his car,” said Hamilton. “We kind of went in different directions today, we’re all trying different things to try and find the right solution for the car. But all I want is a stable rear and then I’ll be happy so that’s what I’m working on.”

At the opening round in Bahrain Mercedes topped the practice times on Friday but were less competitive over the rest of the weekend. Russell said they are still learning how to get the best out of the W15.

“We did a lot of testing today. In FP1 Lewis started on one set-up, I started drastically different. And then in FP2 we did a complete opposites, we swapped set-up to see what works, trying to learn more about the car, trying to get feedback from us both.

“It’s still early days, it’s only the second race of the season, it’s a new car, we’ve only been at one circuit beforehand. We need to keep on learning. So let’s see what we can we can do tonight, everybody back home is going to be working hard on the simulator and try and eke out a bit more performance.

Despite his quicker time Russell said he had “a little bit of a scrappy session” on Thursday. “I don’t think we probably had the car in the perfect window.

“The lap times were good on the low-fuel. On high-fuel pace I’m not too sure where we’re at really.

“It’s so close again. The Astons have been a bit of a surprise but great to see they’re up there. But we’ve got work to do overnight and see what we can achieve tomorrow.”

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