Lewis Hamilton hopes his Mercedes team sees the incoming limit on engine modes as a “compliment”.
Starting this weekend at the Italian Grand Prix, drivers will only be allowed to use a single engine mode during qualifying and the race, something the six-time world champion has claimed is “obviously” an attempt to slow down the Brackley-based team.
This is because, since the start of the hybrid era and particularly this season, Mercedes has been well-known for what became known as a ‘party mode’, a special setting which gave the drivers a boost in power over a single lap.
And asked again about it on Thursday at Monza, Hamilton was seeing the funny side of all the talk surrounding it.
“I find it quite amusing,” he said. “The FIA said it was so they could manage everyone’s usage of the engine or something like that and then Red Bull came and said we were the ones pushing for it! So completely different reasons why they did it.
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“But I think it’s a compliment at the end of the day. Hopefully the guys at the factory see it as a compliment [that they are] doing such a fantastic job with the engine.
“We will continue to work and improve with the situation we are given and be interesting to see how it plays out during the weekend.”
It’s not known how much of an impact the change will have, with some suggestions Mercedes trialled their new mode last weekend during a dominant weekend at Spa.
And Hamilton too is remaining calm.
“I’ve spoken to the engine crew,” he revealed. “I know the implications of the rule that’s come in to try and take away, to try to slow us down but I don’t think it’s really going to make big difference.
“Of course, we are confident that whatever is thrown at us we go to the drawing board, we hash it out, we communicate, we delegate and then we execute it. That’s what we do.
“Keep throwing the punches and we will do our best to return back just as hard.”