"Relentless pursuit of perfection" key to Mercedes' success - Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton has hailed Mercedes' "relentless pursuit of perfection" as one of the principal reasons behind its dominance of Formula 1.

Hamilton heads into this weekend's Eifel Grand Prix at the Nürburgring with a second opportunity of equalling Michael Schumacher's record haul of 91 race wins, and with the German's mark of seven championships also in his sights this season.

As a team, Mercedes is additionally poised to clinch its own record of seven consecutive constructors' championships, on the back of winning 97 grands prix to date since the introduction of the turbo-hybrid era in 2014.

Initially dismissing his personal contribution to such dominance, Hamilton said: "I always speak about me being just one of the links in a very, very big chain, so I could never ever say it was all down to me.

"There is a huge group of people who work so hard week in week out who I'm so grateful to. It's a real privilege.

"That's the best part of this job, apart from driving this rocket around the track. It's seeing these amazing minds come together and creating things throughout the years. Innovation really is at its highest."

In then recognising the role he has played since joining Mercedes in 2013, Hamilton added: "From my perspective, there are things I know about that I've been heavily involved in from day one, changes that I've been able to help the team implement, and that's often happened each year.

"Valtteri [Bottas] and I get to play the rudder role, almost helping steer that powerful group of innovators in a direction that helps us do what we do best.

"Being a team player, that's what I've been trying to work hardest to deliver on, and then ultimately it's the weekend, with all that pressure, with all the things we have going on, delivering performances on and off the track, above and beyond, regardless of whether or not we are ahead on performance or behind.

"I think if you look at the races we've had, if we're behind the Red Bulls or the Ferraris, we've still won races, and that's been done through great communication, I would say, and just the relentless pursuit of perfection, which Toto [Wolff] always talks about."

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