Lewis Hamilton facing "serious challenge" over two-day Nürburgring weekend

Mercedes

Hamilton facing "serious challenge" over two-day Nürburgring weekend

Fog wiped out Friday practice

Ian Parkes

Friday 9 October 2020 18:10

Lewis Hamilton is expecting the Eifel Grand Prix weekend to be "a serious challenge" following the cancellation of Friday practice.

With fog around the Nürburgring preventing the medical helicopter from flying to the nearest designated hospitals, teams and drivers were left twiddling their thumbs across the two 90-minute sessions.

It now leaves just the 60-minute final practice session available to collect the data required on both short and long runs ahead of qualifying and the race.

Article continues under video

Hamilton, who chose to make use of the additional free time by walking his dog Roscoe and reviewing on-board footage of a previous wet race at the circuit, said: "It's definitely frustrating to miss out on days like this.

"We probably wouldn't have got a huge amount of running in really because we're limited on tyres and it's going to stay like this for the weekend.

"We couldn't even do an install lap with the helicopter grounded, but everyone's in the same boat."

Asked whether the prospects for the weekend remained exciting, Hamilton added: "Definitely, especially if it stays like this, wet, but with a clearer sky, you what I mean.

"It definitely makes it a serious challenge with less practice, so I look forward to that."

Team-mate Valtteri Bottas, who also described the day as 'a bit wasted', is now focused on the final practice session.

"We need to be really efficient on what we do in practice three," said Bottas. "Obviously, we will have to change the original plan for FP3 as today was compromised.

"So we're going to have to make the most of it with short runs for qualifying and long runs for data for the race. As a driver, you need to be quick at picking up things and be efficient."

Before you go...

Truncated Eifel GP "the type of weekend you can have your moment" - Ricciardo

Schumacher gains crucial insight into F1 despite fog ruining debut