Hamilton: Mercedes can now 'close the gap' and fight for wins

Lewis Hamilton believes that Mercedes' steady progress over the summer augurs well for the team's performance in the back half of the 2022 season and for a return to the winner's circle.

Mercedes has worked tirelessly to solve the porpoising and bouncing issues that undermined its W13 car in the first part of the season.

But gradually, through trial and error and a lot of race weekend experimentation, the Brackley squad's engineers managed to understand and mitigate the chronic problem.

Performance subsequently returned, and while it didn't allow Hamilton or teammate George Russell to fight for an outright race win, a steady run of podiums was achieved, with both drivers finishing among the top three in France and last time out in Hungary.

Hamilton therefore reckons that a win could be on the horizon at some point in the next nine races.

"I do, definitely," Hamilton said ahead of F1's return to action this weekend at Spa.

"I think of course we've been improving, we've had this consistency that's come up in the recent races and great progress the team is making, everyone pulling together and continuing to push.

"And the car's becoming more of a racing car, which is not particularly what it was at the start of the year, more like a normal racing car in the sense of its characteristics.

"And the last race was the best showing that we've had so far, and that for us was a huge boost that we can close that gap.

"Naturally it's going to continue to be tough, we will keep our heads down. The other guys are doing an amazing job, but I do believe we can close the gap."

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Russell, who leads Hamilton in the Drivers' standings by just 12 points, highlighted the Mercedes team's collective effort in the midst of its struggles, which proved crucial in putting the outfit back on track.

And the 24-year-old is on the same page as his illustrious teammate when it comes to the latter's optimistic outlook.

"Absolutely I share that confidence," Russell said. "I think it's based on the fact we've made a huge amount of progress.

"I think we're also bringing more performance to the car in the coming races, which is really exciting, and I think we learned a lot in the last few races prior to the summer break.

"So, it's really kind of inspiring to see how the team has pulled together in the tough moments at the start of this year and seeing how we've closed that gap.

"I think there's plenty more to come and we're giving it everything."

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