Lewis Hamilton explains how McLaren can beat Red Bull this year

Summer is the time to take stock of the different championships. On the side of manufacturers Formula 1, the fight has never been so close in several years. Red Bull certainly leads as usual since 2022, but the margin over rival teams is small: 42 points on McLaren, while the English team was 115 points behind at the time of the Miami Grand Prix, marked by the first success of Lando Norris (McLaren).

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More worryingly, McLaren is on a convincing streak of 10 consecutive podium finishes and won the Hungarian Grand Prix at the end of July with Oscar piastri. As for Red Bull, we have missed the top step of the podium since the end of June and the Spanish Grand Prix (Max Verstappen 1st).

This reversal of forces gave rise to relevant reflection among Lewis Hamilton. The seven-time F1 world champion, who played for McLaren between his debut in 2007 and 2012, believes that the Woking firm could overtake Red Bull by the end of the season in Abu Dhabi (December 8).

“It is not impossible, it is even an enormous and difficult task, but absolutely not impossible, declared the man with 103 Grand Prix victories to from the American site Forbes.

“McLaren has two very strong drivers who are able to compete with, opposite and at the moment, only one car which is really there to score a lot of points”, analyzes the Englishman leaving for Ferrari in 2025. A small remark addressed to the free fall that Sergio Pérez has achieved since his contract extension at Red Bull last spring (last podium to date in Miami at the beginning of May). “So McLaren has something they can work with, that’s for sure! »

For his part, Zak Brown, the boss of McLaren, judges that the fight for the Constructors' title risks being decided at the very last event. “There’s not much of a gap between the cars. This will depend on the performance of Sergio Perez. If he performs as he is usually capable of, it will be a tough fight. But, if he continues to perform as he has this year, we have a good chance, because we have two drivers who are constantly at the front with Lando (Norris) and Oscar (Piastres). "