Upbeat Lewis Hamilton keen not dwell on past disappointments
Lewis Hamilton insists that he was able to put past disappointments behind him when he headed to Austin – and that he was inspired by visiting the Mercedes factory for the constructors’ World Championship celebrations.
Hamilton experienced a difficult weekend at Suzuka, getting involved in a spat with the media and losing ground in the title battle to teammate Nico Rosberg after a poor start. However, he says all that was forgotten by the time he got to the USA.
“As soon as I left the last race, I left whatever was behind, behind,” he said. “I don’t dwell on it anymore. I’m able to move forward, and in all honesty it wasn’t straight after the race, it might have been a day or so after the race that it feels a little bit painful, but hey you move forward.
“You train, you work, I was in the factory with the guys, seeing all the team was definitely a huge boost and really uplifting to see over 1,000 people all celebrating what we’ve all worked for. It’s an incredible thing. I got to the factory, and it’s all about them.
“And then I continued to work hard with the engineers. Honestly, this weekend is the first weekend of the whole year that I knew the start was going to go well. And that’s a great feeling. I wish I had it a lot earlier.”
Hamilton said that he had never lost faith despite his last win coming in July.
“I’ve tried to keep a positive mentality. Obviously Spa went well, I had the best pace on the weekend in Monza, but didn’t get the best start which decided that. Singapore obviously wasn’t great. Malaysia was great, and then it wasn’t great. So no, I’ve still continued to keep a positive frame of mind. I’ve got to; there are still points available, anything is possible. The moment you give up, that’s the moment you’re doomed. I’ve never given up all my life, I don’t plan on doing so.”
He also denied that he was more relaxed in Austin than he had been tin Japan: “I don’t personally feel that’s the case. It was just a different weekend. Of course if we’d come off a win in Malaysia, I would have been on Cloud Nine going into the next race. I wasn’t on Cloud Nine, but I love being in Japan, I felt fantastic going into Japan.
“I was only off by 0.07s in qualifying, and obviously the race was a disaster. But I think I was in… I’ve battled through thick and thin through my whole career, so it’s nothing new to me. I don’t have the championships I have through luck. And this is not my 50th win through luck. It’s a lot of hard work and dedication from lots and lots of people, but also me keeping my cool and doing the homework. I feel great of the work we collectively did this weekend, and I hope we can continue to do that moving forwards.”
Regarding Rosberg’s points advantage, Hamilton was asked if his own experience in 2007 – when Kimi Raikkonen stole the title from McLaren after closing a significant gap over the last two races – provided any inspiration.
“Honestly, I don’t try and compare it to other times. But history has shown lots of ups and downs and changes. If you look at history, there have been times when it’s been dead certain already. And times when it has flipped, so that’s why I’ve just got to keep my head down and keep trying to do the job I did this weekend, which I believe I can do. I can’t control what’s going to happen to this point, it’s already been set what happened in the past. All I can do when I leave this season is know I did everything with a full heart.”
