Seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton has stated that the new aerodynamic regulations have “failed”, with Max Verstappen having claimed his second World Championship with four races still remaining this season.
Hamilton was involved in one of the closest title battles in the history of the sport with Verstappen last season, something he labelled as “intense”.
The pair entered the 2021 season finale level on points, in what was literally a winner-takes-all scenario, with Verstappen ultimately coming out on top.
2022 has been a completely different story, with Verstappen having cruised to the crown thanks to Red Bull having “walked away”.
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Hamilton thinks the sport needs to not be afraid to change the rules again to stop this from happening, with the 37-year-old admitting himself that whilst claiming a title early is great for the driver, “it’s not spectacular” for the sport.
“Definitely, I feel for the fans,” he said.
“For everyone and even for us last year, going right down to the wire, that was intense for everybody.
“It’s never great when the season finishes early. Even when I’ve experienced having it finish early in places like Mexico, for you as the individual, it’s great. But for the actual sport, it’s not spectacular.
“I’m really grateful to have had like 2008, when it right down to the last 17 seconds and obviously last year, pretty much the same thing. Let’s hope for the future it’s a bit better.”
The new regulations have worked in the sense that the cars are able to run closer together; however, Verstappen has still managed to somewhat cruise to 12 victories this season from the 18 completed races.
As a team, Red Bull have claimed 14 wins and Ferrari the other four, with Mercedes yet to win this season.
The three frontrunning teams have actually secured their dominance arguably more than ever before, with Lando Norris being the only midfield driver to have claimed a podium this year.
With all of that in mind, Hamilton hopes “more changes are made” to “create better” racing for the fans.
“Yeah, they [the new rules] are supposed to [close up the grid], but it’s not achieved what it was supposed to achieve, so yeah, we failed in that,” he claimed.
“But when you fail once you try again and fail a second time and continue to try, so I hope more changes are made to try and bring all the teams closer and create better quality throughout the racing space.
“It’s my hope that we are all closer so we can have better racing and more overtaking. Red Bull has walked away with it this year. They have done a great job.”
Whilst his 2021 rival has raced away to glory once again, Hamilton has endured his worst season in the history of the sport.
As it stands, he is set to finish an all-time low of sixth in the Drivers’ Championship, including, behind new team-mate George Russell.
The Stevenage-born driver is also looking likely to see his streak of having won a race in every season he’s competed in end as well, unless he wins one of the final races of the season.
You’d think that this would bother the Brit; however, he doesn’t “really care” with records not being a priority of his.
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“Of course, I’m trying to get that win this year, but the record is not that important for me because I don’t really care about records in general,” he stated.
“We have to be realistic, that Red Bull is almost unbeatable.
“It’s going to take some real doing to beat that car. Performance-wise, they are fully ahead of everyone.”