IMAGO / ZUMA Press Wire

Despite Mercedes’ recent positives at the 2024 Canadian GP, their struggles at the start of the season cannot be ignored. Their first few races of the campaign were worse than seen in previous years but what was more perplexing was the advantage George Russell had over Lewis Hamilton at the moment. Since Hamilton is leaving Mercedes at the end of the year, there were claims that Mercedes ‘sabotaged’ his car’s performance. However, an F1 journalist has now debunked that theory.

On the ESPN F1 Unlapped Podcast, Laurence Edmondson insisted that Mercedes has no reason to deliberately “scr*w” the 39-year-old over.

“I don’t think that’s true whatsoever. You know Mercedes have no interest whatsoever right now in hampering or hamstringing one of their cars. Why would they at the moment? They’re struggling to get podiums“.

At the same time, Edmondson admits that Mercedes is favoring Russell slightly. Hamilton will be a Ferrari driver in six months’ time, and the F1 expert feels it is only natural that Mercedes will shift its focus to a driver who is their future.

While Edmondson doesn’t pay much heed to the ‘sabotage’ stories, it is pertinent to note that  Hamilton’s own comments kickstarted these speculations. The Ferrari bound driver claimed that he doesn’t see himself outqualifying Russell for the rest of 2024. The way he said the same, raised some eyebrows.

Lewis Hamilton’s controversial remarks after Monaco GP qualifying disaster

In Monte Carlo, Hamilton was comfortably ahead of Russell in terms of single-lap pace throughout all the practice sessions. When it mattered the most, however, he could only muster P7, while Russell got a starting position two places ahead.

This surprised Hamilton, who later admitted, “I don’t anticipate being ahead of George in qualifying this year“. When asked for an explanation, he simply smiled. “We’ll see,” the seven-time World Champion said.

Hamilton didn’t explicitly mention any sabotage theories, but there were claims that the Brackley-based outfit was not on the same page as him.

Irrespective of whether these theories have any weight or not, Hamilton’s qualifying form is concerning indeed. Russell currently leads the seven-time champion 8-1 in their qualifying head-to-head.