Mercedes boss slams 'IDIOTIC' Hamilton mistake

Mercedes chief Toto Wolff gave a furious interview after qualifying for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, calling a mistake which led to Lewis Hamilton's elimination in Q1 'idiotic'.

This weekend's race will be Hamilton's last with Mercedes, ending a 12-year partnership which brought the legendary driver six of his seven world titles.

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While the partnership has yielded six drivers' championships for Hamilton and eight constructors' titles for the team, the 2024 season has been a pretty dismal one for the 39-year-old.

In 24 race events Hamilton has been outqualified by team-mate George Russell on 19 occasions, and sits down in seventh in the drivers' championship, with only two victories in Silverstone and Spa rescuing his disappointing final season with the Brackley outfit.

Hamilton's final Mercedes qualifying

Despite adopting a rather negative attitude for large parts of the 2024 season, Hamilton has appeared chipper at the Abu Dhabi GP, keen to end his Mercedes spell on a high.

However, the seven-time world champion suffered another disastrous qualifying, being knocked out of Q1 and now set to start the race down in 17th after Charles Leclerc's penalty.

While Hamilton suggested after the session that he may still be able to cut through the field thanks to Mercedes' strong race pace during practice, Mercedes team principal Wolff was not happy about his team's errors during Hamilton's final qualifying.

The seven-time champion was sent out right at the end of Q1 to complete his lap, only just making it over the line in time to start the lap, and being stuck behind a plethora of cars.

"I just need to apologise to Lewis, also to everyone on the team who worked so hard to making it a great end for him," Wolff told Sky Sports.

"He was the quicker guy with that kind of set up that we chose on the car, also to experiment for next year, and we totally let him down.

"Idiotic mistake of not going earlier. Inexcusable, inexcusable. I’ve really been so down about what has happened. This is the worst part of it because it was just idiotic."

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