Hamilton said: “If you look at the speed traces, we start losing deployment going into Copse. Normally the engine is screaming going into there and you are holding on for dear life. This year most likely we will be downshifting from seventh to sixth to keep the revs higher. It will be a long straight from Nine (Copse) and (to) 10 (Maggotts) with no deployment.
“Maggots and Becketts will not feel the same, because you have to lift and coast through there for a period of time.
“So it’s a completely different track. Maybe we will still get to enjoy it where you’re not power-limited, but the best parts of the track are Copse and Becketts and Stowe and in those parts the power is just dropping. Hopefully they can rectify it for next year.”
He added that Ferrari’s deficit to Mercedes could be “twice as big” as it was in the Austrian Grand Prix last weekend as a consequence of the nature of the track.
A number of drivers made similar comments to Hamilton.
Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso said: “With no deployment at all, we cannot forget that this year we have significantly less power than last year and less power than F2. That is the case when you cut the deployment. So, yeah, (a) challenge.”
But Mercedes driver George Russell, the winner in Austria, said it could have a beneficial effect on the racing action.
“We know we’re going to have some tracks where the straight-line speeds are going to be far quicker than last year and some tracks are going to be more challenging,” Russell said.
“On the flip side, the racing could be quite interesting. And on those energy-starved tracks so far, Melbourne, especially with racing, was quite exciting.
“And unless you watch the onboard, I don’t think you’re going to really know. You’ve got 600,000 fans here. I’d probably say 95% of them wouldn’t notice it. And even hardcore fans from the outside, I don’t think you’d really notice it. It’s just when you watch the onboard, you listen to it, it doesn’t sound great.”
Russell said that the problem was made worse by the decision of governing body the FIA not to allow straight-line mode – in which front and rear wings open to reduce drag and downforce – on the run from Turn One to Turn Three, and between Copse and Becketts.
This was done for safety reasons. The decision could have been reversed at a meeting on Thursday morning but five of the 11 teams voted against.
Russell said: “All the teams had to agree. There were five teams against, which I don’t really know why. If anything, you’d say the Mercedes teams would be against because we should have the deployment advantage. But we were in favour because we just think it would be better. And I drove on the sim (simulator) with and without and it makes a huge difference.”
Some teams had concerns about safety at specific parts of the track where the straight mode could have been reinstated, sources have said.
F1 has already taken decisions that will change the ratio of internal-combustion to electrical power over the next two seasons to alleviate this issue.
