sport news Lewis Hamilton suffered the most painful race of his career in Baku trends now
Even if there was a hint of Olivier playing Lear about Lewis Hamilton’s agonised climb out of his car, the damage done to his back may be so severe he could miss Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix.
That was the verdict of Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff after this bumpy race in Azerbaijan won by defending champion Max Verstappen for Red Bull, as Ferrari suffered the terrible humiliation of a double retirement.
As for Hamilton, he was beaten by team-mate George Russell for the seventh consecutive occasion, finishing fourth and a place behind his 24-year-old thorn. Russell showed no signs of back pain as he gadded about the podium. Hamilton, in contrast, ‘prayed’ for the race to end.
Lewis Hamilton struggled with back issues during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Sunday
When it did, he sat in the cockpit and summoned help. He perched on the ‘halo’ as he struggled to accomplish his exit manoeuvre. If his bouncing horror of a Mercedes — the product of new regulations introduced this season — was the cause of the discomfort, his 37 years hardly helped him.
Wolff, asked whether he feared for Hamilton’s participation in Montreal on Sunday, said: ‘Yes, definitely. This is not muscular any more. It goes properly into the spine and it can have some consequences.
‘He is really bad and we have just got to find a solution (to the regulations). He is maybe the worst affected of all drivers, but pretty much everyone says something needs to be done. For Canada, we need someone on reserve duty, which we do anyway.’
Stoffel Vandoorne, a competent Belgian who previously drove for McLaren, and Dutchman Nyck de Vries, the Formula E champion who has yet to make his debut at the top level, are both possible replacements.
Reserve driver Stoffel Vandoorne may race for Mercedes next week instead of Hamilton
Hamilton claimed he almost crashed during what he called the most painful race of his career in a car Wolff described as a ‘s***box’. The seven-time world champion, who is 37 points behind Russell, said: ‘I’m sore. Very, very sore. There were a lot of moments when I didn’t know whether I was going to keep the car on track.
‘The last 10 laps, my back was just... I was having to go internal, “You’ve got this, you can do this, just bear with it”. The concern is, at 180mph, bashing into a wall. I’ve never had to think about
