Hamilton warns rivals he's as 'dangerous' as ever ahead of 2022 season kick-off

As he heads into the 2022 Formula 1 season in pursuit of a record eighth drivers’ World Championship, Lewis Hamilton has explained why he believes he as ‘dangerous’ a driver as he has ever been.

Hamilton will be seeking to regain the World Championship in 2022 after narrowly losing out to rival Max Verstappen in a tense finale in Abu Dhabi last year.

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And speaking in a video uploaded on Mercedes’ Twitter page, Hamilton was asked whether he believed that improvements he’d made to his pre-season preparations made him a more “dangerous” driver than he had ever been, to which he replied: “I would say so.”

He added: “Naturally, your body does age, you do fatigue as you get older, it is a slower recovery. But I wouldn’t necessarily say I’m too down in the slope; I still feel like I relatively at the top!”

Hamilton, who enters his 16th season in Formula 1 this year, also explained what had improved in his preparation over the years, while sharing details about his strong partnership with Mercedes.

“I feel I am more efficient in how I train,” said Hamilton. “I’m much more in tune with my body in terms of knowing when I can push and when I can’t push, when I am recovered and when I am not, how I am feeding my body in terms of fuelling it. I am way more into that than ever before, sleep, all these sorts of things.

“I’ve got all the experience over the years; I’ve got the great rapport of my team. We’ve been together 10 years so I think we probably have the strongest partnership I would say.”

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Hamilton also shared insights into his preparation before a race and why – unlike some other drivers – he prefers to stay calm before the lights go out.

“I’ve just personally found – it’s not the same for everyone, but for me it’s just about being as calm as I can be,” said Hamilton. “It’s calming the nerves, calming your thoughts, slowing it all down so that you can execute smoothly and efficiently.

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“I don’t need to be doing sprints before I go out. I’ve tried all that stuff and it didn’t work for me. It just made me hot-headed, and I overacted to certain things that I was experiencing.

“Just before the race I’ve usually got some music in my mind that I’ve been listening too. I kind of switch off. I’ve being doing this for such a long time, I don’t need to overthink what I’m going to do. I’ve done all the studying and the preparation for it, now I will go and do what I do, what I’ve done my whole life, just go and have fun.”

The fun begins for Hamilton shortly, with the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix weekend on March 18-20 – with Mercedes seeking to bounce back from a challenging test in Bahrain that Hamilton described as “tough” in a recent appearance at the Expo 2020 Dubai event.