Hamilton hints at Mercedes upgrade delay

Mercedes may not race their upgraded engine at this weekend’s French GP with the team set to make a decision after Friday’s practices.

Although Mercedes initially intended to join Ferrari, Renault and Honda in introducing a B-spec engine at the Canadian Grand Prix, an issue found on the dyno saw that delayed.

The team, though, may not even run in Sunday’s French GP.

According to reports, Mercedes may run their old engine in Friday’s practice before deciding whether they want to replace that with the upgrade ahead of Saturday’s running.

Either way, Hamilton and team-mate Valtteri Bottas are expected to take fresh engines from Saturday whether that be the old spec or the new one.

“At the moment, I don’t know,” Hamilton said regarding Mercedes’ engine plans. “I think I might have one of my new engines out of my three, which is good enough.

“The engine that we’ve used for the first seven races has been a great engine.

“A fresher, newer version of that is going to be great, and have more power than the [high mileage] one I raced in the last race, obviously. And so I personally am not concerned.

“Tomorrow or the next couple of days we might have a better understanding of where we stand with that.”

He added: “Let’s just wait and see. I’ve been on the phone to Andy [Cowell, Mercedes’ engine boss] last week and into this week and I have absolute full confidence in him and the guys.

“I don’t really want to say too much at the moment as I don’t know what Andy’s planning, but I trust in whatever decision those guys make.

“It will be for the right reasons. We’ve done the seven races with great performance up until now so even if we are to take the older-spec, I’m not worried about it.”