Lewis Hamilton has revealed he is pushing his Mercedes team to consider developing parts for 2019 that he could test before the end of this season.
With wins at four of the last five races, the championship pendulum has swung firmly in the Briton’s favour as he now holds a 40-point lead over Sebastian Vettel with six races to go.
Though insisting after Singapore he was not ready to take anything for granted, Hamilton has admitted he and his team have begun looking at areas of focus for the W10.
“I pushed them a lot about next year’s car. I know what I need improving,” he said. “I am pushing the guys because they have to sign off things now for next year’s tests already.
“I’m saying, ‘Can you bring things forward? Please make this component which takes a lot of work but I might get it to the race because I want to feel it on a race weekend, rather than next year in February or March.’
“When we start testing it is too late, so I am keeping the pressure on these guys.”
One reason why Hamilton and Mercedes are confident enough to do so, is the strides they have made with the current car in recent races, ironing out some key weaknesses.
“We started off the year, I felt great and then we tailed off and we had some struggles with the understanding of the car, how to utilise the equipment that we had tyre-wise and balance-wise, we had a couple of so-so races, and then luckily we found our footing,” he explained.
“We’re going from strength to strength as a team in our understanding of the car, how to utilise the tools that we have.
“We are far more comfortable at our job right now – six races ago we were definitely questioning, but I think we’ve now figured the car out, we know where we are and we know what we have got to do.”