Sir Lewis Hamilton had a cheeky interjection when speaking about his pace at the British Grand Prix with Sky Sports’ Ted Kravitz.
Hamilton had been chasing down the Ferrari pair of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc in Silverstone, and he went long on his first stint, giving him fresher tyres than the prancing Horses, so he was closing at an even faster rate of nots in the latter stages of the race.
However, a late Safety Car allowed Sainz to pit for fresh Softs along with the seven-time world champion, while the Scuderia made the strange choice to leave Leclerc out on old Hards.
Sergio Perez had been brought back into play after contact with Leclerc sent him tumbling down the order, and they both cleared Leclerc after he had been dispatched by Sainz.
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The 37-year-old finished P3 to earn his third podium of the season, but it might have been more had it not been for the late Safety Car, as he looked the quickest of anyone for large periods of the race.
Kravitz noted that the Briton was the fastest “car” on track, so he was quickly reminded by Hamilton, who said “driver you mean.”
He was certainly not wrong, but in Formula 1, as Hamilton knows himself very well, the highs are very high, and the lows are very low.
The 103-time race winner crashed in qualifying at this weekend’s Austrian Grand Prix along with team-mate George Russell after they had both looked in contention to compete with Red Bull and Ferrari, so Hamilton’s crash at Turn Seven that will see him start the sprint race in ninth was a real gut punch.
“Incredibly disappointed in myself ultimately,” he told Lawrence Barretto after qualifying.
“And, so sorry to the team, everyone worked so hard to put this car together and I never like to bring it back damaged.
“We were fighting for top three I think, and I don’t have an answer for it.
“I just lost the back end in Turn Seven and that was that.”
However, such has been the pace of the W13 this weekend, that Hamilton is looking forward to tackling the sprint race as well as Sunday’s grand prix.
“I’m encouraged for sure,” he added.
“I am encouraged of course to see our performance, we weren’t expecting that to be as close as that today so that’s a huge positive from the team.
“But, I’m really quite far back so I don’t know what’s possible from there but we have a sprint race as well so I hope that tomorrow I can make up some lost time.”
Hamilton has won two of the 10 races held in Spielberg since the return of the circuit to the F1 calendar in 2014.