Hamilton: 'Don't know if Red Bull are at their best with maximum wing'

The United States Grand Prix lasted a few laps too long for Lewis Hamilton. Otherwise, he could have taken his first win of the year. However, the Mercedes driver is tempering his expectations for the final three GPs of the season, as he says he only raced to that first place thanks to a dramatic pit stop by Red Bull Racing. Hamilton does hope, however, that the gap with the Austrian racing team will also narrow a little this weekend.

"The race worked out to be close, but more so because of Red Bull's problem pitstop. We may have come out ahead of them with a normal pitstop, but he would've overtaken me straight away," Hamilton told Sky Sports about the undercut he went for at the Circuit of the Americas. "They had four-five tenths on us in the race pace last weekend. Never a point we would keep them behind us."

Lots of downforce in Mexico

The Mexican circuit being raced on this weekend is at high altitude, which makes for thin air. So the drivers will be driving with a lot of, or as Hamilton says 'maximum', downforce. "I don't know whether Red Bull are at their strongest with their max wing but they were strong last year so I anticipate them to be strong this weekend. I hope we're in the mix again because it was really fun last week."

Hamilton can only dream of a win. He cannot put into words how much that would mean for him and Mercedes. "This year we didn't do the job that others have done, it would be a blessing if we did get a win. The emotions that would come out would be unmeasurable. If it doesn't come, it's okay. We just take that energy, there is hope, we know where the car is wrong. And we know where we need to put it to make it better," he concludes.