Lewis Hamilton makes team-mate claim after early-season struggles

Lewis Hamilton believes he is the "best team-mate" he has been in F1 this year after helping Mercedes address various issues with its W13 concept.

The Silver Arrows has struggled in F1's new era, falling off the pace of Red Bull and Ferrari at the top of the grid and leaving Hamilton and George Russell fighting to fend off other teams' advances towards the 'best-of-the-rest' positions.

Mercedes has also been forced to deal with aggressive porpoising earlier in the season and, whilst that phenomenon has been overcome, mechanical bouncing through stiffness remains in abundance.

This has led to the two drivers often trialling wildly differing set-ups in Friday practice sessions in order for the engineering team to try and find a fix.

But it is Hamilton who has more often than not been given a more aggressive and ultimately incorrect set-up direction.

The seven-time champion has mustered only two podiums so far this season and asked how he would

Assessing his campaign so far, during which he has only mustered two podiums, Hamilton replied: "I don't look at my season too often and assess, in a sense of judgement. I mean, I'm working as hard as I can, staying positive.

"We’ve come off the back of a difficult year and I'd like to think I'm the best team-mate I've ever been, to George, but also to all the engineers, all the mechanics and everyone working at the factory, and trying to keep everyone's energy high.

"I am trying a lot of different experimental things on the car to help us get the data and move forwards.

"Whilst, yes, it's not been ideal on some weekends, it's often set us back because we lost a session or two but that's okay because eventually we'll get there and I’m proud to have been a part of that process."

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