F1: Lewis Hamilton Explains Why He Wanted To Retire During The Spanish Grand Prix
Lewis Hamilton showed incredible performance during the Spanish Grand Prix as an incident on the first lap with Kevin Magnussen pushed him back to 19th after starting in 6th place. Despite this, he made his way back through the pack and even with overheating issues towards the end of the race, he finished fifth.
But before he made his triumphant return, Hamilton called in to the team to question whether he should even try, telling them they may as well save the engine for another race.
“It’s not being defeatist,” he said when asked about this. “It was just I was literally 30 seconds behind.”
He admitted that he was uncertain that we wanted to “use a whole engine to drive around in last or out of the top 15, and at one point we might have to take a penalty or something like that”.
He then added that he had a similar race in Jeddah where he dropped out in Q1 and found it incredibly difficult to make places back during the race.
Yesterday was another day that reminded me just how much I love this sport. Going from your emotions hitting the floor to ending on a high is such a thrill. All of our hard work as a team is starting to pay off. Together we are making progress! Can’t wait for this weekend. pic.twitter.com/fsNLeocoap
— Lewis Hamilton (@LewisHamilton) May 23, 2022
“I don’t know if reliability is an issue,” Hamilton noted. “We’ve already seen today at the end there was something. I was like, we might as well just save the engine so we live to fight another day.
“But I’m glad we didn’t, and it just shows you never stop, you never give up, and that’s what I did.”
This performance from the Mercedes W13 has given Hamilton much more confidence in the car, especially after a great showing of performance during qualifying, too. this extra performance has come from an array of upgrades which have been put in place to minimise porpoising. There’s no doubt they’re doing their job.
“Since the last race of the year, it’s been difficult all round.
“To then have the difficulties that we had with the car, to have constant knock backs with certain issues, safety cars and all sort of things, [there has] just not really [been] much fortune.
“But [we] just keep getting back on the horse, and keep pushing, and never giving up. To start the race today positive, and then have that problem [at the start] but then to come back, it felt a lot like some of the olden days, older races that I’ve done.
“That for me feels amazing.”
Monday evening saw him tweet the following:
“Yesterday was another day that reminded me just how much I love this sport. Going from your emotions hitting the floor to ending on a high is such a thrill. All of our hard work as a team is starting to pay off. Together we are making progress! Can’t wait for this weekend.”
It’s safe to say a lot of fans will be waiting excitedly for what’s to come this weekend as we run up to the Monaco Grand Prix.
