My ‘attention was elsewhere’ Hamilton confesses

Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he didn’t complete the 2015 season fully focussed.

The British driver won his third Formula One World Championship by winning the United States Grand Prix at the end of October, a milestone that was important to the Mercedes driver as it meant that he had emulated his idol Aryton Senna.

It was heavily reported that from that point Hamilton went on a long run of celebrations and parties, splitting his time between competing in the final three races of the season and globe trotting.

His behaviour was criticised in some quarters, especially once it appeared that it had taken a toll on his performances.

Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg narrowly defeated Hamilton in qualifying at Mexico, Brazil and Abu Dhabi, handing the German the advantage and enabling Rosberg to claim a hat-trick of victories for the first time in his career.

‘It made me think ‘OK, next year Nico is going to be super quick and super strong’,’ Hamilton told the BBC.

But whilst Hamilton would never admit it at the time, he has now confessed that he was not fully committed by that point of the season.

Of course, I love winning and that’s always the goal – but to be honest my attention was elsewhere at that point, It had been such a successful season and you can’t win them all, so that was my feeling at the end of the year.’

It’s quite frankly a disappointing confession, both for his supporters and probably his sponsors and it’s a confession he also didn’t need to make.