Mercedes mechanic explains Lewis Hamilton's bizarre starting technique to F1 races

The unique hand position that Lewis Hamilton takes up on his steering wheel at the beginning of Formula One Grand Prixs has been explained.

To many Hamilton is the greatest of all time, after all he does share the record of most drivers' world titles with Michael Schumacher and holds it on his own for most wins and pole positions.

Gareth Bale is still not over the fact that the British driver doesn't have an eighth world title, when he was controversially denied in 2021.

That'll hurt even more if a challenge for his first ever championship for McLaren from Felipe Massa is successful in the near future.

One of the things that has made the Mercedes driver so good is his ability to get the most out of his cars, which have often been the best on the grid but he's almost always been ahead of his teammates.

Recently fans have noticed one position he gets the best out of the car is at the start, with an unusual placing of his hands, and it's now been explained in the video below.

"Do you know why Lewis starts like that?", a Mercedes mechanic asks a couple of fans whilst holding on to the top of the wheel with his left hand and putting his right hand on the back of the flappy paddle gears.

"Why do you think? Is he showing you something?

"Or is he holding so you can't....that's going up a gear; one, two, three, four," he continues whilst showing them how the paddle gear works.

"That sides going down. So what you don't want to do is accidentally go down a gear.

"So if you put your hand there," he says once again replicating the hand positions, "you can't go down a gear."

Hamilton did have an issue with accidentally downshifting on the grid around 2017 and 2018 and clearly this was his fix to stop the problem.

Whilst he does have a great influence on the sport none of his contemporaries have seen the need to make the switch in hand position but it's not stopped him winning multiple world titles since switching it up.

Last week showed his influence on the Canadian Grand Prix when his complaints helped the FIA make a change to the course on race day.

Featured Image Credit: Alamy/Twitter

Topics: Formula 1, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, George Russell

Ryan Sidle

Ryan is a journalist for SPORTbible with over eight years of experience. Passionate about all sports, he mainly covers football and F1 - Daniel Ricciardo once spent an entire interview referring to him as 'Ryan Gosling,' still his proudest moment.

@Sidler28