Lewis Hamilton said his British Grand Prix win was a result he urgently required in the championship battle with his team mate.
Hamilton went into the race 29 points behind Nico Rosberg in the drivers’ championship, but closed to within four points of his fellow Mercedes driver after Rosberg retired from the race.
Hamilton had moved up from sixth on the grid to second behind Rosberg and was catching his team mate when Rosberg’s gearbox failed.
“He got quite a good gap at the beginning,” said Hamilton. “I really just tried to look after the tyres. But after that I utilised the tyres, was catching. And then we came out on the harder tyre and I was catching him a second a lap at the time. I couldn’t believe I had that kind of pace.”
“Obviously you never want to see a team mate fall behind. We wanted to really work and get those one-twos. But at the end of the day I really needed this result so I’m very grateful for it.”
“This weekend really just showed that you never give up,” Hamilton added, referring to his mistake in qualifying where he aborted his final run, only to be beaten by five of his rivals.
“Really, yesterday, it wasn’t a case of giving up, I just didn’t think I could do the lap,” he said. “I was really shocked that the last sector was so fast.”
“But coming here today, I have my family with me, just focused, the support from the fans just spurred me on. I really couldn’t have done it without them.”
2014 British Grand Prix
- Bottas wins second Driver of the Weekend in a row
- Silverstone’s 50th grand prix proves a fine vintage
- 2014 British Grand Prix team radio transcript
- 2014 British Grand Prix fans’ video gallery
- Top ten pictures from the 2014 British Grand Prix
Image © Daimler/Hoch Zwei
Dave (@)
6th July 2014, 16:12
Most people would call that giving up.
Bobby (@f1bobby)
6th July 2014, 16:35
Did you think there was 4 seconds to be gained in S3? Come on, that came as a shock to everyone. He held his hand up that he made a bad decision but I’d have done the same thing.
Michael Brown (@)
6th July 2014, 17:39
He gave up on his final lap and went in. Other drivers chose to commit to the entire lap and found more time.
Dave (@)
6th July 2014, 18:33
No-one thought there was four seconds, but five drivers had a go regardless.
Jason (@jason12)
6th July 2014, 21:06
@raceprouk
Lewis saved his gearbox there. …
Stroke of genius!
Dave (@)
7th July 2014, 8:05
That’s one way to think about it I guess :)
kpcart
6th July 2014, 16:18
of the 3 retirements this season by Mercedes, this one for rosberg was the most costly, leading the race well into the race – probably could have held on to win like in austria. hamiltons retirements – the one in Melbourne, who knows how the race would have panned out – rosberg was quicker in practise sessions. his retirement in Canada he was behind rosberg – and possibly retired as he was too harsh on the car, while rosberg managed the same problem.
John Well
6th July 2014, 16:22
Keep finding excuses if it helps you sleep at night. At least it is 2-1 now.
Chris (@cgturbo)
6th July 2014, 18:58
Exactly where was the need to lash out?
Calm down; he’s entitled to his assessment of the situation – an assessment I agree with.
John Well
6th July 2014, 20:29
That is my opinion too. Could you respect that too.
Chris (@cgturbo)
6th July 2014, 21:51
“Keep finding excuses if it helps you sleep at night” is not an opinion. It’s an attack on someone else’s opinion.
Jason (@jason12)
6th July 2014, 21:08
I wouldn’t call that lashing out.
Another DNF from Nico will even things out.
Bobby (@f1bobby)
6th July 2014, 16:33
Check your facts, Hamilton was leading when he retired in Canada having leapfrogged Rosberg in the pits.
Listen, they’re both very good drivers but going into this race Rosberg has had the rub of the green.
JCost (@jcost)
6th July 2014, 21:59
@f1bobby exactly. Lewis was on pole in Australia and overtook Rosberg in Canada before retiring with break issues. I don’t get his comment.
Rio
6th July 2014, 16:35
I think you’ll find Ham had actually got past Ros in Canada, and then had his failure.
Patrick (@paeschli)
6th July 2014, 16:56
I think Hamilton would have won this one anyway, that one stop strategy would have worked like a charm
Sumedh
6th July 2014, 17:17
I agree with you on only the Canada part.
Although he was ahead of Rosberg when he retired, the radio communication clearly shows that Hamilton’s brake bias was more rearwards than Rosberg’s and that caused Hamilton’s retirement.
IMO, it is 1-1 now and Rosberg leads by 4 points after 9 races which I think is a fair assessment of the season. Hamilton, the quicker driver but more prone to mistakes. Rosberg, the consistent driver always present to pick up the spoils after Hamilton self-destructs.
Patrickl (@patrickl)
7th July 2014, 8:40
So setting your brake bias a bit more towards the rear means he destroyed the car?
If that’s a setting that the car and team allows him to use he would expect it to work.
petebaldwin (@petebaldwin)
6th July 2014, 17:27
You can look it how you like – assuming Rosberg would have won today, he’s lost 25 points through DNFs. Hamilton (presuming he wouldn’t have won at Canada or Australia and would have finished 2nd instead) has lost 36 points through them.
Robbie (@robbie)
6th July 2014, 18:36
Let’s not forget NR lost 7 points in Canada too, as his similar problem to LH’s saw him have to give it up for DR to take the win. So it’s not really ‘2-1’. It’s all part of the game which is why I have tried to urge people to not look at it as NR leading ‘just’ because of LH’s dnfs. It’s about many factors and NR has still had to put in the days he has no matter what has happened to LH. Same with LH. And if you are going to go down the road of it coming ‘just’ down to dnfs, then let’s take away LH’s WDC, won by one point, since FM had 3 dnfs to LH’s 1 that year. And…if it is ‘just’ about dnfs, then why did LH’s fans celebrate the same as if it was a hard-fought win? Answer…because that’s racing.
Dan
6th July 2014, 19:52
Course it is 2-1 lol, NR 1 non finish Ham 2 non finshes. You’re just a Ros fan who is gutted like we were. I mean you telling me Ros driving performances were 29 points better.
Robbie (@robbie)
6th July 2014, 22:01
You telling me NR’s problem in Canada did not cost him 7 points? Just saying if we want to just talk about reliability issues, it’s more like 2 to 1.3… ie. closer than we think, while at the same time pointing out it’s about many factors. I’m not gutted and I had hoped that a dnf for NR might start to level the playing field to those who continue to claim the ‘only’ reason he was ahead of LH was due to his dnfs, like NR hasn’t also been putting in some great performances and is not squandering the package he has. Of course as we see there are still those that just want to boil it down to 2-1, and I think that belittles NR’s great work.
JCost (@jcost)
6th July 2014, 21:55
1. Lewis was on pole in Australia when his cylinder failed.
2. Lewis was leading Rosberg in Canada when his brakes failed allowing Nico to retake the position he lost to Lewis after a good in-lap from the Briton.
What’s the difference? The only difference I see is Lewis has scored 2 DNF versus 1 from Nico.
Robbie (@robbie)
6th July 2014, 22:08
So you don’t even want to acknowledge that the same problem on Nico’s car cost him 7 points that he had to give up to DR in Canada?
Fabio (@efsl0)
7th July 2014, 0:29
I acknowledge that Nico gained 18 points.
Uzair Syed (@ultimateuzair)
6th July 2014, 16:18
Bring it on! The championship is back!
Lari (@lari)
6th July 2014, 16:28
Weird to see British crowd cheer when a Brit (Hamilton) passes a Brit (Button). Is Button not so liked in the UK or?
James_mc (@james_mc)
6th July 2014, 16:33
Not really – Button has consistently won the Autosport fans-voted award of late, mainly on account of his popularity. I think on the F1F popularity poll he also comes out on top.
I suspect it’s more to do with the fact that the British supporters would like to see Hamilton challenging for the title so it was better that he got past Button quickly.
Lari (@lari)
6th July 2014, 16:41
That’s what I was thinking also, that I must’ve seen some poll about Button’s popularity, might have even be here in the F1F but I was starting to doubt my memory. So basically they cheered because they knew deep inside that Button couldn’t realistically fight for the win and Hamilton was the only one (sorry Chilton) that was able?
Shrieker (@shrieker)
6th July 2014, 17:26
Chilton :D
Chris (@cgturbo)
6th July 2014, 19:00
@lari
You’re being a bit harsh… I’m pretty sure Max would have had a chance of the win had it not been for the gearbox and drive-through penalties!
Lari (@lari)
7th July 2014, 6:23
@cgturbo Also had it not been for Kimi’s flying tire that damaged his car and ofc slowed the laptimes by several seconds ;)
medman
6th July 2014, 17:29
This:
en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/158827.html
Bobby (@f1bobby)
6th July 2014, 16:34
I think everyone was just excited in the moment. Plus Hamilton was the only one with a realistic shot of catching Rosberg.
shadow (@shadow)
6th July 2014, 17:26
I have been to Silverstone before and I can confirm 90% of fans are for Lewis and rest for Button and other drivers. Lewis is very popular here. May not be so popular with respect to Button on websites like this and autosport or with the people actually taking the polls but when you go to the track, Lewis has unbelievable support! Even Jenson admits that.
petebaldwin (@petebaldwin)
6th July 2014, 17:28
It was for the Championship so people are backing Lewis. If it was the other way round, Button would have got the same cheers.
sonia luff (@sonia54)
6th July 2014, 20:47
Personally I’m English and can’t stand Lewis. I appreciate his driving skills but he acts like a spoilt brat.
usukpam
7th July 2014, 6:48
You can aswell jump the clif and no one will miss you after all, since you are English and cant stand Lewis.
Patrickl (@patrickl)
7th July 2014, 8:42
So you don’t like any F1 driver?
I couldn’t think of a single F1 driver who hasn’t whined about his competition, his car and/or his team.
Corrado (@)
6th July 2014, 16:36
I bet he’s happier about ROS DNF rather than winning the race.
Lari (@lari)
6th July 2014, 16:42
Well, it’s -25 points vs -7pts in difference with the two situations so, I’d guess so :) I would be :p
petebaldwin (@petebaldwin)
6th July 2014, 17:31
I’m sure he is! Gave a good political answer on the podium interview but for the Championship, a Rosberg DNF and Hamilton coming 5th is a better result than Hamilton winning and Rosberg coming 2nd.
The Constructors championship is all but Mercedes’ now anyway as there isn’t another team that are clearly in 2nd place to capitalise on any issues so the talk of getting 1-2s for the team is just political speak at best.
Robbie (@robbie)
6th July 2014, 18:42
I disagree that it is just political speak. As if the team has now decided, just because the math favours them already for the Constructors’, that it no longer matters if they make 1-2s. The race is still on between the two teammates, moreso than ever, so of course 1-2s are the order of the day and will be until the WDC is decided. Do you think they have lost their pride and determination along the way? Or that now each side of the garage can relax? No way, I say.
Chris (@cgturbo)
6th July 2014, 19:02
Glad about Hamilton’s win.
But the thing I especially loved was his little chat about Monsters Inc. in the post-race interview.
I had a smile throughout that :D
BJ (@beejis60)
6th July 2014, 20:21
@cgturbo Was that the story about the gold trophy or something? I didn’t understand that reference. Either way, happy to see the championship is back to neck and neck, but sad to see the Iceman accident. Hopefully he won’t miss a race.
Chris (@cgturbo)
6th July 2014, 20:33
@beejis60
It was in response to a question along the lines of “did the crowd help cheer you on?”
And Lewis said “It was like Monsters Inc. At the beginning of the movie, they use fear as energy, but they learn that happiness is a lot more powerful. The crowd was like that; they gave me more energy today than my sadness yesterday.”
Obviously I’m heavily paraphrasing, but that’s roughly the gist of what Lewis said :)
JCost (@jcost)
6th July 2014, 22:08
Lewis really was in a good place despite his bad Saturday. After that slow pit stop his radio message to the crew was very polite and intended to put pressure off the pit crew in lieu of creating a tense and unnecessary atmosphere. Lewis needs to keep his head where it is and let his feet and hands do the rest.
Jason (@jason12)
6th July 2014, 21:11
Getting this result in Silverstone of all places, with his family there…..
What more could a man ever ask for?
Jason (@jason12)
6th July 2014, 21:15
I hope Nico is not heavily rattled by this result.
We don’t want the WDC decided early.
Jouetsdejohn
6th July 2014, 21:22
I was watch from France, so didn’t get the UK commentary, but it looked like LH had the upper hand, pitted much later (so possible 1 stop), lost only a couple of seconds over Rosberg on fresh tyres, and the set about taking 5 tenths a lap out of thereafter. Rosberg then reported a GBox problem (when the gap was around 4 secs). I challenge anyone to say that LH wouldn’t have won today if Rosberg’s Gbox hadn’t given up. Lewis loved the tyres, was sailing and would have won. Rosberg retiring is an uneasy christmas present……
BP
6th July 2014, 22:14
Lewis was ahead of Rosberg both times he had problems. In Australia he started running on 5 cylinders during the formation lap, this allowed Rosberg to pass him at the start. In Canada, he was ahead of Rosberg when his brakes gave out. So lets stop propagating the myth that Rosberg was ahead when Lewis started having problems.
BlueChris (@bluechris)
8th July 2014, 7:12
Im not a supporter of any of both drivers but i like better LH driving. In my mind MERC need to do something about their DNF’s… as i think it in my mind something is telling me that because this 2 drivers are almost equally fast and the cars are totally same both use the car in the limit in some settings for a long time. I know the team control and watch what a driver do in setting as the race goes but let’s not forget that in a normal day MERC’s maybe they will have 50secs gap of the field in almost all tracks.
So my thinking is to go a bit easier with the car and lower its limits a bit. I cannot blame them that they letting this happening because simply they have the Constructor WC in hand and for sure one of the two drivers will win the drivers champ but by lowering a bit the limits in settings they can fix their DNF’s problem and they will still win.
That’s my thought atm and am not a MERC fun at all… even though i respect their progress this year.