Sunday 22nd June 2008
A defiant Lewis Hamilton has insisted that he will not be derailed from winning the World Championship despite being hit by another controversial penalty during the French GP.
The McLaren driver was given a drive-through penalty by the Magny-Cours stewards for missing the chicane on the opening lap of the race despite his team being adamant that no advantage had been gained as Hamilton was already past Sebastian Vettel.
Metaphorically, and possibly literally, speaking through gritted teeth, Hamilton told reporters: "There's nothing you can do that can distract me. You can keep on giving me penalties and whatever you want to do and I'll keep battling and try and come back with a result."
Asked repeatedly if he felt the penalty was unjust and his McLaren team was being victimised, Hamilton replied: "I'm not going to answer that."
"I did everything I needed to do, I stayed out of trouble and drove what I thought was a fair race. We just missed the points, so that's three races now without scoring points but there's still 10 races to go," he continued. "If I'm 20 points behind I don't care, I will still come back."
Eventually persuaded to speak about the incident with Vettel, which effectively cost him any chance of finishing in the points, Hamilton commented: "I don't particularly feel I did anything. I went into the corner. I believe I was ahead on the outside and I couldn't turn in on the guy otherwise we would have crashed so I took the outside line, lost the back on the marbles and went over the kerb. I continued because I don't believe I overtook him by going over the kerb, I actually took him before that."
The Englishman refused to speak to the press immediately after the race, snubbing British race broadcasters ITV, but denied he was angry with the media.
"I feel cool," he vowed. "It's all good. Racing is racing. I'm still here, there's nothing you can do to get me out of it."
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