Formula One news

Hamilton: "There's no hope"

A downcast Lewis Hamilton struggled to contemplate another poor race in Barcelona after the World Champion finished the Spanish Grand Prix in ninth place and out of the points. The McLaren driver remains seventh in the championship, although former team-mate and rival Fernando Alonso now shares the spot.

"What can I say, you know? I drove my heart out, as I always do, and it's just that this car is just not going to, I don't know - I just had no grip, no grip," Hamilton told the BBC after a race in which a bad start meant he almost was involved in the Turn 2 pile-up. Lapped on Sunday by race winner Jenson Button, the Champion now lies 32 points behind the championship leader.

"I'm not even thinking about that now, we're not even half way through the season," Hamilton continued. "For sure I don't have a car to win the championship, but what's a shame is that the team have done a fantastic job, every weekend they do a fantastic job; we've got great reliability and the morale in the team is fantastic but it's just a shame that they're not giving me a car to defend the championship with. Everyone's wondering what's going on but the car is that bad, I'm driving the socks of it, but there's just no hope."

Lewis then seemingly reflected on his earlier comments with a more positive outlook: "This is part of racing, you have times like this - the car is really hardcore but I want to say a big congratulations to Jenson, he's done a great job again and I look forward to racing him at some stage again."

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