Hamilton admits ‘pulling a sickie’ to miss F1 test

Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he has “pulled a sickie” to miss a Formula 1 test because he dislikes it so much that he has feigned illness at least once in his career.

The Mercedes driver has never camouflaged how little he appreciates testing, which is definitely more confined than it was in 2007 when he appeared in F1. Now, race drivers for teams typically only participate in F1’s official tests, whereas test drivers are invited to private test days and, in some cases, shakedowns of brand-new automobiles.

In a post-season interview at Mercedes’ Brackley central command, Hamilton was joined by his group head Toto Wolff and hold driver Mick Schumacher yet not his colleague George Russell, who was unwell. Wolff told the collected group Russell hadn’t pulled a “sickie” by professing to be unwell when he wasn’t.

Wolff stated, “George is really ill.” Hamilton conceded “I was pondering!”

“In the past I have done that to miss the test days, since I just for the most part could do without test days,” he proceeded.

“So yesterday when I heard that he was debilitated, I was like ‘ah, he’s one-increased me, he’s gone to another level.”

Although nothing else was said about Hamilton’s absence from a test, he has previously missed driving lessons when illness was cited as the reason. He missed a day of running in 2015 because of illness, according to his team, at the Circuit de Catalunya in Spain.

Mercedes called up their test pilot Pascal Wehrlein to sub for him. Hamilton successfully returned to the cockpit that year and won the world championship.

Hamilton likewise missed the 2020 Sakhir Excellent Prix in the wake of getting Coronavirus. Around then F1 and global travel rules expected him to seclude while testing positive for the ailment, which managed him out of dashing in Bahrain. He returned at the following race multi week after the fact in Abu Dhabi. The next year Hamilton uncovered he kept on experiencing the side effects of Coronavirus.

In 2017 Hamilton moved to a plant-based diet which he has credited with working on his wellbeing and assisting him with adapting to the developing length of F1 seasons.