It’s been a long year for Lewis Hamilton. He announced his departure from his Mercedes team before a car had hit the track in anger in 2024, and the team’s performance was turbulent all season long.

But in his final race for the Brackley team, Hamilton had something to smile about. On the final lap, he mustered all the “perfection” he could find in order to pass his teammate George Russell and sign off on a high.

Passing Russell “took perfection,” says Lewis Hamilton

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

The 2024 season was always going to be a strange one for Lewis Hamilton. Early in the year, well before any Grand Prix had yet taken place, Ferrari announced that it would be signing the seven-time World Champion for the 2025 season.

While there must certainly be comfort in having your plans sorted out so early, that quick decision had its downsides — especially considering the fact that Mercedes‘ car took several races to come into its own.

Speaking to media, including PlanetF1.com, after the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Hamilton took a moment to reflect on his season, his final race, and what the year was like.

Though he wrapped his time at Mercedes with a last-lap pass on his teammate, Hamilton insisted that he didn’t do so because he “needed the confidence.”

“I have the confidence,” he reiterated.

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Yet it was still a relief to “finish off with a strong, hard battle and no mistakes.”

Hamilton praised the “solid drive” that saw him finish in fourth place, noting that “It’s been a really, really turbulent year, probably the longest year of my life, I’d say, because we’ve known it from the beginning that we we were leaving.”

He compared that early announcement to an interruption in domestic bliss.

“It’s like a relationship,” Hamilton explained, “when you’ve told whoever your counterpart is that you’re leaving, but you’re living together for a whole year.

“Lots of ups and downs emotionally, but we finished off I think on a high today.”

That ‘high’ comes largely down to a strong last-lap pass on teammate George Russell. After running over a bollard in qualifying, Hamilton was knocked out in Q1 and started the last race of 2024 from the back of the field. His driving skill and his ability to take advantage of the misfortunes of other saw him in fifth place as the laps whittled away.

Russell was 14 seconds ahead of Hamilton when the latter driver snuck into fifth place. And on the final lap, Hamilton was finally in striking distance.

“He was driving great,” Hamilton said of his teammate. “Obviously started a lot further ahead than I did, so to catch the 14 seconds was tough.

“He was putting in good laps, and so it took perfection — like, I really had to put together the best laps I could possibly do.”

Hamilton compared this race to the one in Las Vegas, where “I was catching for a period of time and then stopped.”

In Abu Dhabi, Hamilton said, “I was trying to make sure that I kept taking chunks out of that gap.

“I only caught him right at the last lap, and I was like, I’ve got to make this, now or never. And so I just went for it.”

It was an audacious move, but it was the right one: With just a few corners remaining in the race, Hamilton managed to sling into fourth place, bringing to an end his impressive tenure with Mercedes.

After a year of ups and downs — of race wins and race retirements — Hamilton was able to say ciao to his team on a positive note.

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