Hamilton upbeat despite “disastrous” brake setting choice

Hamilton was almost 0.3s slower than Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg in the afternoon session, but explained that a “disastrous” brake set-up choice had not worked out.

“I wasn’t comfortable in the second session,” he said.

“We made some changes which generally made the car better but then we had some brake setting changes we made which were disastrous. So I was struggling to finish a lap without oversteer, but we’ll fix that for tomorrow. There’s loads of room, once we’ve fixed the braking we’ll be back on the pace I’m sure.”

On a positive note, Hamilton said he was happier with the supersoft tyre than some of his rivals.

“For me the supersoft was really good,” he said. “It was lasting relatively well to be honest, it wasn’t as bad as potentially it was for some others. It is a faster tyre, so people are going to start on it, and then it’s who can look after it most in that first stint.”

In FP2 Hamilton wasn’t just beaten by Rosberg, but by Daniel Ricciardo as well – which led to him acknowledging the threat of Red Bull.

“It looks like they’re very quick this weekend, so yeah it’s definitely going to be a challenge,” he added. “Today Ricciardo was looking very quick, I guess. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll get a better understanding, but they’re definitely not far behind.”

While Hamilton has won three times at Austin, he denied that he has any inherent advantage over his teammate.

“Honestly it doesn’t make any difference. History is history. It’s a new year, it’s a new time, it’s a new car, it’s new technology, so it doesn’t really make any difference,” he said.

“Every time I come here I’m always looking to improve. You go out there and you’re discovering new areas, so it’s like starting again from scratch.”

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