Lewis Hamilton’s British Grand Prix performance was compromised because Ferrari lost the GPS data trace from his car, team principal Frederic Vasseur revealed.

The data stream is an important part of the team’s strategic decision-making as it allows them to accurately trace the car’s position at all times.

“We lost the GPS from Lewis all the race,” Vasseur told media including RaceFans at Silverstone. “It meant that we were completely blind and we didn’t know where the car was.”

In the rain-hit race, Hamilton avoided making the same costly strategic error of pitting for slicks on the formation lap as his team mate did. However the timing of his two pit stops was less than ideal.

He lost places when he made his first pit stop for a fresh set of intermediate tyres later than those around him. He then switched back to slick tyres too early later in the race and went off the track twice. That cost him vital time to Nico Hulkenberg, who beat him to the final podium position.

Vasseur said it had been a very challenging race in which to get the timing of every tyre change correct. “You can say now that it was probably one lap too early [for slicks] also because he went straight on in turns three-four and he lost four or five seconds in these two corners.

“But Alonso pitted before and he was already faster in some corners than all the guys that hadn’t come in yet. It’s the kind of situation where if you wait for others to do the move before you, it’s always too late.

“It’s quite easy after the race to say that the first stop would have been better to step one lap before, and second pit stop to stop one lap later. But honestly on this when you have to take the decision on the pit wall, it’s very difficult because you have to be always in communication.”

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