Lewis Hamilton has explained that his SF-26 had a “subtle difference” in set-up to Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari, prompting him to ask Carlo Santi to have a look at his teammate’s car during the United States Grand Prix.

Leclerc had the better pace during Sunday’s 56-lap race, as he brought his car home in second place while Hamilton was off the podium in fourth place.

Lewis Hamilton explains Ferrari radio message about Charles Leclerc’s setup

The teammates lined up fourth and fifth on the Circuit of the Americas grid, with Leclerc ahead of Hamilton.

Both made up positions on the opening lap to run third and fourth behind Kimi Antonelli and Max Verstappen.

By Lap 12, Hamilton was almost four seconds behind Leclerc and eight seconds behind race leader Antonelli.

“I’m struggling to turn the car, particularly in low speed,” he told his race engineer Santi over the radio.

Hamilton was one of the first to stop, swapping his soft tyres for a set of hard Pirellis. But still struggling to match the pace of the frontrunners on the fresh tyres, he told Santi to have a look at Leclerc’s set-up.

“Next stop we need to put in a lot more wing mate. I can’t turn the car,” the Briton said.

He added: “Have a look at what the other car has and see how far we need to be from there.”

Ferrari adjusted Hamilton’s front wing, with the Briton in a “better place” for the final stint as he worked his way up to fourth place.

It was, however, a case of what could’ve been if he had run the same setup as Leclerc from the very first lap.

“Wrong setup really,” Hamilton explained.

“There’s a subtle difference between Charles and me and our cars in the race, and it’s mostly to do with flap, how much wing you put in.

“I think we’ve just been under-hitting it. We continuously under-hit it for some reason.

“When you do the lap to the grid, it feels like the car is good, and then as soon as the race starts, massive washout and understeer. I couldn’t do anything about it.

“They just pulled away. I lost those eight seconds, and that’s really why I didn’t get that position in the end.”

Hamilton claims a “sure” podium would’ve been on the cards if he’d started with the front wing adjustment.

“I think it would have it would have been a bit different if we had started with it,” he said. “I think FP2 where we do the long run, that’s where Charles got the experience on that setup, and I didn’t get the long run on it. As I said, a bit of a back foot.

“But lots of positives to take. The team did a really great job with pit stops and the strategy, and we obviously had decent pace today, particularly last stint.

“If I had that in the first two, we would have for sure been on a podium.”

“I think lots of learnings,” he continued. “I think for the next races, if I can really get on top of this balance issue that I have, I think we can get much better results.

“I think if I had had the balance that I need, even if I just had the balancing of the last stint, I would have been right in the fight all the way to the end.”

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Ferrari debuted a raft of new parts for the SF-26 in Austin, with the package focusing exclusively on aerodynamic refinements, featuring a revised sidepod profile, a reworked floor edge board, a modified diffuser, and underbody floor revisions.

Hamilton believes Ferrari is getting there, both in execution and with its updates.

“I feel like the team have been doing a really, really good job. Yeah. They acknowledged it,” he said.

“I think also, I’m like in the background, I’m working on this pivotal moment in terms of steering the car in the right direction for next year. So I’m really working on areas that we need to improve for next year’s car.

“So that’s been part of the discussion this weekend, the next couple of weekends, the feedback back to the guys who are designing the parts for next year, just pointing out to them where we can improve on the actual chassis side and the aero package.”

Hamilton remains third in the Drivers’ Championship on 241 points, one point behind Russell, as they battle to finish second behind Antonelli.