Lewis Hamilton was heard repeatedly expressing his dissatisfaction with his 'slow' and 'broken' Mercedes car as Max Verstappen effortlessly secured victory at the Chinese Grand Prix.
The Dutchman claimed his fourth win in five races this year in a race disrupted by two safety car periods, twice establishing a comfortable lead.
McLaren’s Lando Norris secured second place with Sergio Perez finishing in third on the podium.
Hamilton, who started the race in 18th after a disappointing qualifying run, finished in ninth place on a day where the 39-year-old voiced his frustrations.
Hamilton expressed his concerns about his tires as early as the second lap, stating 'this car is so slow' in the 16th lap as he struggled to overtake while in 14th place.
Eight laps later, Hamilton remarked over the radio 'the car is just sliding around everywhere like something is broken. It’s really bad.'
Hamilton later took advantage of the safety car chaos to move into the top 10 of the leaderboard.
Following the race, Hamilton said: 'I’m thankful just to get into the points. I honestly didn’t expect much more this weekend.
'Hopefully, we have a step forward coming at the next race. We’ll be back at the factory next week and we’ll try to position the car better for Miami and hopefully have a better weekend.'
His Mercedes teammate George Russell finished in sixth place but also failed to challenge the likes of Red Bull and Ferrari.
Attention will now turn to Miami on 5 May with team principal Toto Wolff promising a more competitive performance.
'Considering where we put the cars, altogether for the drivers and the team it was not a good position for today. Not good enough, overall,' he said.
'We’re lacking pace so we’ve got to dig deep. We’ve got something coming for Miami that looks like a good step – let’s see where that brings us out.'
