Lewis Hamilton revealed during last weekend’s Dutch Grand Prix that he put on a lot of weight during the summer break, resulting in an “extreme diet” being required.
Driver weight in Formula 1 is an extremely delicate topic, given that they have to control it so accurately during the season.
Hamilton is one of the fittest drivers on the grid and often posts photos and videos of his workouts onto social media, something he’s seemingly had to ramp up recently.
The seven-time World Champion revealed at Zandvoort that he came back from the summer break too heavy, with him being 3-4kg heavier than what his weight has to be for ultimate performance.
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As a result, the Mercedes driver has had no choice but to go on an “extreme diet”.
”I ate so much food. My weight has to be between 73 and 74 kilos, and I was almost 77 kilos on Saturday,” he revealed.
“So I had to go on an extreme diet these past days.”
Hamilton did a lot of travelling between the Belgian Grand Prix and the Dutch GP, with the 103-time race winner having visited Los Angeles, Namibia, Tanzania, Rwanda and Kenya.
The 38-year-old is, of course, vegan, and has lived of a plant-based diet since 2017.
Hamilton gradually transitioned to being fully vegan, to allow his body to become used to such a new diet.
His current drastic measures to lose weight will seemingly impact what he eats, to ensure that he’s in a calorie-deficit.
Managing his diet can’t be easy with having two races back-to-back, with this weekend being the Italian Grand Prix.
All of the races in the second half of the season will come thick and fast, giving little time for rest.
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Hamilton will be keen for a much better performance at Monza this weekend than he managed at Zandvoort, in what was a largely disappointing event for him.
He struggled in qualifying and could only salvage 13th on the grid, before an early blunder by Mercedes dropped the Stevenage-born driver almost to the back of the field.
Hamilton did well to recover to sixth by the end of the race, but he lost ground on Fernando Alonso in the Drivers’ Championship after the Spaniard finished second.