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McLaren
Question: Lewis, on the day that you passed the title of World Champion to your compatriot, Jenson Button, you were on the podium in the Brazilian Grand Prix: a heavy fuel load, a very early stop to get the soft option tyre out of the way and a great run to third place.
Lewis Hamilton: Yeah, today’s been an extremely tough day, tough weekend, and today was a huge surprise to me. I had no idea that we would even be able to get into the points. The team did a great job with the strategy but I was on a knife edge the whole way. I feel great, the car felt great. I think there are still some improvements we need to make but to fight all the way up to third from 18th I think is a great job from all the team, so hugely thankful to them for the hard work, the good job they did. I had an incredible battle with Rubens. I must say congratulations to Jenson: a great job from him, a great season.
Question: In the early pit stop there was a drama in your pit crew with Heikki Kovalainen, your team-mate. I guess you were not aware of that and it didn’t play any part in your race?
Lewis Hamilton: No, I thought I saw a Ferrari behind me as I was pulling out and I thought it would be close but I didn’t really see that Heikki was actually behind. I didn’t see any dramas that he had but I hope everyone in the pit crew is OK and we will probably have to work on that to find out what went wrong.
Question: And third place in the Constructors’ Championship is still very much alive for Vodafone McLaren Mercedes.
Lewis Hamilton: Yeah, I’ve got the bosses breathing down my neck to get the job done, so today would have definitely made them happy and we really needed it, considering we were both right at the back and weren’t really looking to get points, so this would go very well. I’m sure the lads in the team are very happy and bosses are too.
Question: Lewis, how important was KERS here, particularly for overtaking?
Lewis Hamilton: That was probably one of the toughest races I’ve had, not as tough as last year, clearly, but it was good. I think we qualified 18th. We were quite unlucky in qualifying and very fortunate with it being dry today. We had a very good pace, we just stayed out of trouble. KERS definitely helped at the start. If we had the fastest car or as fast a car as maybe Mark here and we had KERS on top we would be light years ahead but KERS, for us, just recovers what we lose in a straight-line because the efficiency of our car is not good at all. But generally today we did a great job, we’ve done a tremendous job to catch up throughout the year and we’re stuck with the car we have. We know it wasn’t the best car, we stuck with it and just kept pushing and pushing and pushing, and we’re doing the best we can and I tell you, there’s not much more if any more we can get out of this car. It’s been a really good learning experience and today was great. I just have to say a big congratulations to Jenson and the Brawn team, great job by them for the whole season. I definitely look forward to having a better car to challenge them next year.
Question: Lewis, it’s the first time in 40 years that Britain has had back-to-back World Champions. I wonder if you could offer your thoughts on what this means over the past two years for British motor sport.
Lewis Hamilton: I don’t think I have a clue if I’m honest. I think it’s fantastic for our country to have – I think in the last couple of years – such great athletes coming through. It’s been a good couple of years for us, with the Olympics and some seriously good talent coming through. It’s been great for the sport, great for all the fans. I’m sure the fans back home are extremely happy to have two World Champions two years in a row. I can only assume that they are very, very proud, that’s all I can say.
Question: Lewis, would it be fair to suggest to Jenson that he’s only got it on loan for a year?
Lewis Hamilton: I don’t know. That’s the plan, for sure. I’m not going to take anything away from his championship. He did an incredible job this year. He kept up the pressure, the pressure was extremely immense for him these last few races and I saw him today and whilst he was trying to keep a cool exterior, I know exactly what he’s going through. I just said to him ‘you don’t have to do it in this race but just keep your cool’ and clearly he did, so I’m very, very happy for him and his family. But I definitely plan on taking it back from him at some stage.
