Former Formula 1 driver Jolyon Palmer has dampened some of Lewis Hamilton's optimism leading into the 2026 season, as he pointed to aspects of the cars under the new regulations that might not suit the seven-time champion.
Hamilton has been much more positive about the 2026 F1 season as he puts the ground effect era behind him. While Palmer noted that some areas of the new regulations will lean more into the Briton's driving style, there are still factors, such as difficulties with braking, that might suit his Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc or Red Bull's Max Verstappen more.
"He never quite got on top of the ground effect generation of regulations that we had from 2022," Palmer told F1 TV ahead of the race weekend in Australia. "Nor did Mercedes or Ferrari, so the teams that he was with, they were never the top car. But I felt like he was always never quite at one with it, which he has been for the rest of his career.
"So this generation of car, they have no ground effect as such. They're not planted on the deck as they were with the venturi tunnels, where you want to have the car as low as possible, get the airflow underneath those venturi tunnels to get the downforce. It's different.
"So we've got rake in the car. We've got more feeling than the driver. And I think that aspect will help Lewis. I think he'll feel the car moving a little bit more, where maybe he had more of a numb sensation in the last generation. So maybe that will suit him.
"But there are other factors that I'm not so sure about. There are difficulties in braking. There's a lot of derating into the corners. So, the cars stop deploying energy. You have lift and coast, or you have some super clipping, it's called, as the cars derate into corners.
"It's a strange way to drive the car when you're actually slowing speeds sometimes into some of the big stops. Maybe not necessarily one of Lewis's great strengths. He loves to attack the brakes really hard, and he loves a stable rear end.
"When we saw Charles Leclerc at the end of testing really hustling the Ferrari, dancing it, the rear end coming out. I feel like it's a car that maybe suits Leclerc or Verstappen more for that reason. We will see. Maybe it will be better for Lewis. There's arguments for and against."
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