Hamilton to keep Barcelona secrets until retirement

Lewis Hamilton says he will keep details of the aftermath of his collision with team-mate Nico Rosberg in Barcelona secret until he retires.

The two Mercedes drivers came together on the opening lap of the race as Hamilton lost control on the grass when attacking his team-mate. The collision was dismissed as a racing incident by the stewards but caused tension within the team and Hamilton told fans during a UBS Q&A that he will not reveal the full details until after he stops racing in F1.

“When I was younger, if I had a bad race, I was so hard on myself, it was a real negative,” said Hamilton. “I remember some races, I wouldn’t leave my hotel room for three or four days, not speaking to anyone, not being on my phone. I was just trying to get myself out of this dark place I’d be in.

“Then somehow I’d pop out of it and turn it into a positive. You’ve got to look at the situation, you’ve got to try and find the positives from it and leave the negatives behind.

“I look at Barcelona for example this year, it was a massive low for me. There’s things that you won’t know until I retire that I’d tell you what I experienced. The next day, I got up and I went for a run, and I’m thinking about lots of different things and it’s crazy to think that the 43-point deficit that I had at the time, which seemed impossible.

“I’m only human, those days I feel like it seems impossible, you’ve just got to keep going as painful as it can be and as hard as it can be. You might get over it quickly, sometimes it takes longer, but you’ve just got to keep going.

“Honestly I feel I’m stronger now. I have those days where it feels like the world’s coming to an end, I’m never going to win this championship, blah, blah, blah. Look where I am now, one point behind in the championship. If I had given up at any point... It shows you to never ever give up, no matter what."

From the cockpit: Felipe Nasr on the green grass of home

Scene at the British Grand Prix

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.