Hamilton delivers verdict on upgraded Mercedes W14 after Canada

Hamilton scored his second consecutive podium finish of the year in Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix, finishing third behind Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso.

Since Mercedes introduced their upgrade package at Imola, Hamilton hasn’t failed to finish outside the top four.

Interestingly, he’s also had a comfortable edge over Mercedes teammate George Russell.

Speaking after the race in Canada, Hamilton was asked how the W14 felt now it had been heavily upgraded.

He replied: “In truth, it doesn't feel a huge difference to the beginning of the year. There are some elements of the car which do feel different and obviously with the upgrade but it's just simply just have a little bit more downforce on the car. 

“But the characteristics of the car are very, very similar to what we had earlier on in the year and so we need to… for the future, for next year's car, you need to take a lot of these different things off and change them for sure.”

Hamilton doesn’t think that the inherent handling characteristics of the W14 are good enough to be able to beat Red Bull, particularly with how the car handles the kerbs.

“It's definitely not the car that… characteristic-wise the car that's going to be able to beat the Red Bull just yet,” he added. “And so we've got to work on that. For example, it was very bumpy, this track, and I think everyone was struggling but our car was very stiff. 

“But I think we were all struggling with the stiffness of our cars. But today was bumpy. That's the one that thing that… I would say that's something I dislike most about this generation of cars, right? Back in the day was smooth down the straight.”