Lewis Hamilton has claimed he is still some way off his best form despite his best start to a Formula 1 season.
A fourth win of the year in Monaco saw his lead over Valtteri Bottas grow to 17 points as Mercedes’ run of 1-2 finishes came to an end.
However, weighing up his performances, the five-time champion insists he is far from satisfied.
“I definitely feel that it’s been quite an average performance from myself, maybe above average but generally quite average for the first six races,” he was quoted by PitPass.
“I feel like I’ve got the best I could get. I’ve arrived prepared – the best prepared I could be – but in terms of extracting the true performance from the car, I feel like I’ve struggled a little bit in these six races.
“I guess that’s kind of similar to other seasons, but without doubt, it’s going to improve as the knowledge you gain over the season race by race, particularly with the tyres this year where the window is even smaller, I do anticipate things will get better as it will be for all of us,” Hamilton noted.
“I hope, at some stage, that I’m able to crack the issues that I’ve had and get back to the form that I have within me. Whether that’s the next race or ten races from now, I can’t really say but I am very, very focused on making sure I rectify any of those.”
The Mercedes driver’s comments came after what he described as the “hardest” race of his career in Monaco when the team made the wrong call on tyres but Lewis was able to survive.
“We don’t always get that perfect and on today’s case, I think we’ll definitely learn from it and what doesn’t break you only makes you stronger,” he said.
“I think going into the next race, a lot of analysis will be made and particularly towards trying to understand the tyres better and deliver better in terms of our processes and on my side, trying to work even better with my engineers to try and extract more from my car.
“Also, I know the guys back at the factory are working on developments, so obviously at the next race I think we will probably have a new engine by the next race, so the car will continue to move forward as we will,” Hamilton concluded.
