Following a promising second place in Saturday morning’s dash, Hamilton confronted a restoration race from 18th on the grid.
However the seven-time world champion initially did not make a lot progress on his gentle tyres, rising to fifteenth earlier than transferring on to the medium compound.
He mentioned his automotive had a lot understeer through the first half of the race that he thought one thing was damaged.
“I assumed possibly at first I tapped somebody as a result of I’ve by no means had a lot understeer in my life, so I used to be handing over at sluggish pace and ready, ready, ready,” Hamilton defined.
“I assumed I had broken one thing like among the others as a result of there was particles going all over the place at one level however it was simply the set-up that I selected.
“With higher selections on set-up, possibly we’d be round the place George [Russell, who finished sixth] is however we simply should preserve preventing.”
Commenting on his brief try to make a begin on softs repay, he mentioned: “Oh my god, I used to be the one one, I believe, on the gentle and it fell aside after lap one. It was very tough.”
Hamilton handed a number of extra midfielders and benefitted from the conflict between Lance Stroll and Daniel Ricciardo to assert ninth. However he hopes upgrades deliberate for Miami will give Mercedes a much-needed increase in its battle with Ferrari and McLaren.
“It undoubtedly wasn’t higher than anticipated. We anticipated to be someplace round there,” he added talking to Sky Sports activities F1.
“Hopefully now we have some step ahead coming in subsequent race. Till then, we’ll be again in a manufacturing unit subsequent week making an attempt to place the automotive higher for Miami and hopefully now we have a greater weekend.”
Russell mentioned his sixth place was about nearly as good as could possibly be anticipated after struggling to maintain up with each Ferraris.
“This weekend, we all know the place we’re falling out,” he instructed Sky Sports activities F1. “The final three races we have been type of within the battle with Fernando and [Oscar] Piastri as nicely. P6 is the place we’re proper now.
“It was an fascinating weekend managing to have two totally different set-ups on the automotive between Friday and Sunday. So, some data to undergo however in the end we simply have to dig into the information and simply carry on including efficiency to the automotive.”