Mercedes going “all hands on deck” to beat Ferrari to second – Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton says his Mercedes team are working flat-out to ensure they finish ahead of Ferrari in the constructors’ championship.

Hamilton has finished second over the finish line in each of the last two grands prix in Austin and Mexico last weekend – although was disqualified from the results of the US Grand Prix for excessive plank wear, along with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

Asked how he felt he and Mercedes would fare this weekend at the Brazilian Grand Prix – a race they won last year – Hamilton admitted he wasn’t sure where Mercedes would fit in the pecking order at Interlagos.

“I don’t really know,” he said. “I expect the Red Bull to be very fast. It always seems to work pretty much everywhere – except for Singapore – and we expect the Ferraris to be quick.

“I hope that our car works well here like it did, for example, in Austin but you can just never predict – it could be bad, it could be good. So we’re just trying to prepare the best way we can.”

Hamilton started behind the Ferraris in Mexico, who locked out the front row, but got ahead of both Leclerc and Carlos Sainz Jnr in the race into second place. Hamilton said he expects a close battle with Ferrari over the final three rounds over second place in the championship.

“It’s a really fun, enjoyable battle we’re having,” Hamilton said. ”

“These guys [Ferrari] did a great job in qualifying for the last race but fortunately we were able to leapfrog them. But I think it’s going to be close in these last three races. So it’s going to just take all hands on deck to stop these guys.”

Last year’s Brazilian Grand Prix, won by George Russell, was one of only two rounds that Red Bull have failed to win over the last 12 months. World champion Max Verstappen says that his team are hoping to avoid falling into the same set-up hole as last year during the sole practice session of this final sprint round of the season.

“Last year we didn’t have a great race weekend here,” Verstappen admitted. “The sprint format makes it quite difficult to straight away be on top of things.

“We had a few ideas why last year was not that great, but we have one practice session to make sure that it’s better this year. I think there’s a lot of high deg[radation] here and the way you have to set up the car, a lot of low speed corners. I don’t think our cars particularly, let’s say, amazing in the low speed corners, so I guess we’ll find out.”

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