As Motorsport.com Italia reports, the recurring headache of traffic and impeding in Formula 1 reared its head again during the unusual weekend at Baku, where all practice sessions were pushed forward by a day. Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time world champion driving for Ferrari, found himself accidentally blocking Liam Lawson during the second practice session as the chasing car arrived with a massively higher closing speed.
Here is the core of the problem: cars on preparation or slow laps run strictly on the internal combustion engine to save energy for the straight, leaving the hybrid system dormant. Meanwhile, a car on a hot lap deploys its full electrical battery power. When the machine ahead loses its power or simply lacks the hybrid boost in certain sections, the delta in performance is staggering. Hamilton noted that he was roughly four seconds ahead of Lawson when he began pushing into the final corner, only for his car to run out of juice and watch that cushion vanish instantly.
"When we got to turn 18, the car simply lost power and he recovered the gap in a massive way," Hamilton explained after FP2. The veteran argued that current simulations and FIA directives do not give drivers enough data to judge closing speeds when one car has 500 horsepower less than the machine bearing down on it from behind. He stressed that no driver intentionally gets in the way, but the sheer velocity difference makes it nearly impossible to time things correctly.
Liam Lawson, representing Racing Bulls, backed up that exact assessment after climbing out of his car. The young charger pointed out that a driver can have a comfortable two or three second margin exiting turn 16 at full throttle, yet still see it devoured in a heartbeat due to a speed discrepancy reaching 60, 70, or 80 km/h. According to Lawson, once a driver commits after turn 16, options vanish entirely, making the resulting traffic pinch a genuine safety risk rather than mere carelessness.
Both drivers agreed the topic must land squarely on the agenda for the next drivers' briefing. Hamilton has already proposed a potential fix: making it mandatory to tackle turns 18 and 19 at full throttle with full hybrid power deployed at all times, even on slow laps, to eliminate crawling through those critical sections altogether.
