(Mercedes AMG F1 Team)
Mercedes AMG F1 Team's Lewis Hamilton is ready to carry the momentum of his Italian Grand victory into the next race, the Singapore night race next weekend. Hamilton put the retirement from the Belgian Grand Prix firmly behind him to take pole position for the Italian Grand Prix and went on to win the race just ahead of team mate and championship leader Nico Rosberg.
The 2008 world champion has now closed the gap to Rosberg in the championship to 22 points with six Grand Prix remaining this season.
Hamilton has two podium finishes at the Singapore circuit but has yet to win on the street circuit so he will be hoping that this season will be his year. However, at the last true street circuit at the Monaco Grand Prix earlier this season it was Nico Rosberg who took the victory at that event.
Hamilton has taken six victories compared to Rosberg's four this season however Rosberg leads the championship by virtue of the fact that he has been consistently on the podium when Hamilton has taken victories and although Hamilton has suffered three retirements so far this season compare to Rosberg's single retirement the team have insisted that they are NOT favoring the German over Hamilton.
The team have stated that they don't care which one of their drivers wins this years championship as long as one of them does and that they are more interested in wrapping up the Constructors championship.
Speaking about the Italian Grand Prix, Hamilton told the Press Association Sport:
'I'd like to think this win is a platform, but I have no idea what's going to happen forwards from here, Over the weekend I had quite a few problems, missed almost a whole session in P2, then in qualifying in Q2 the car wouldn't start again, but fortunately it did..As for the start sequence (at the beginning of the race), it could have been a lot worse. That was the best it could ever be considering I didn't have the launch.'
Hamilton went on to say:
'These problems just keep popping up. Paddy (Lowe, executive technical director) said 'It's just so unlucky, with all the engines it just keeps happening to yours.' Hopefully we'll rectify them. Right now, I'm just looking forward, head down, and I see no reason why I can't be as fast moving forwards.'
In a separate development, Mercedes Executive Director of Business Toto Wolff has flatly denied smiling when Nico Rosberg made a mistake going into turn one at the Italian Grand Prix on lap 29 which allowed Lewis Hamilton to take the lead of the race.
Directly after the incident footage that was supposedly live showed Wolff smiling however it has now transpired that the footage was actually shot prior to Rosberg making the mistake and was played on the world feed to make it look as if Wolff was smiling at the German's mistake which was absolutely not the case. Wolff commented on the accusations by saying:
'What is really crazy is that whoever picks that up [the smiling reaction] and tries to interpret in such a picture must be out of his mind, It was not live. Whenever the camera is pointing on you, the signal comes later. It wasn't synchronised with the picture.
Wolff went on to say:
'It is like Big Brother is watching you. So I will hide in the engineer's office next time. There was a smile when the two [Hamilton and Rosberg] were close to each other. It was a 'here we go again, this is a close battle.
© Ben Johnston 2014
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