Perhaps rocket red is not his colour. More likely it was because he was at
that time locked in conversation with the Crown Prince of Bahrain, a major
shareholder in McLaren via Mumtalakat, Bahrain’s sovereign wealth fund.
The pair of them wore grave expressions entirely at odds with the celebrations
taking place next to them. Mansour Ojjeh, another major shareholder, was
also floating around.
The presence of McLaren’s top brass in Monza may have been entirely
coincidental but with all the speculation raging over Hamiltons’ future it
was hard not to link it at least partly to that.
Dennis, the man who signed Hamilton as a 13-year-old and took him all the way
to the world title in 2008, was guarded over the state of contract
negotiations with his moody star, describing them as being at a “delicate
stage”.
“If Lewis is absolutely committed to winning, then he can win in a McLaren,”
was all he would say.
“At the end of the day it’s about winning first and who gets what afterwards
is something that can be discussed.
“It would be totally inappropriate for me to say anything that would undermine
Martin’s position.
“It’s his job to get to where we want to get to — and I’m sure he’ll have a
better position now having demonstrated yet again that we’ve got a very
strong car.”
Whitmarsh was rather more bullish, describing Eddie Jordan’s claim last
Wednesday that Lewis had already agreed terms with Mercedes
as “fantasy” and suggesting that talks with Mercedes were simply
“due diligence” on the part of XIX Entertainment, Hamilton’s management.
“I’m not surprised. I’ve had some knowledge of what’s been going on,”
Whitmarsh smiled, although he did repeat his line of Friday that “we only
want Lewis to stay if he wants to stay.” That is increasingly difficult to
fathom.
On the track, at least, Hamilton was a joy, speeding away at the start to open
up a lead over the field which he never relinquished.
It was just one of a number of magisterial performances on the day.
Ferrari’s
championship leader Fernando Alonso rose from 10th to finish on the podium,
his team-mate Felipe Massa finished a creditable fourth, having pulled over
to let the Spaniard pass him.
But it was Sauber’s Sergio Perez who really caught the eye, the Mexican
climbing from 12th on the grid to pass both Ferraris in the latter stages of
the race and finish second.
The calls for him to replace Massa at Maranello are likely to become more
shrill at this rate.
His joyous celebrations at the end were in stark contrast to the despondency
at Red
Bull who suffered a double DNF for the first time since Korea 2010,
their day falling apart after a promising start which saw Vettel in the hunt
for a podium before being handed a drive-through penalty for forcing Alonso
off the track around the outside of Curva Grande.
It was a role reversal of a similar incident last year, which saw Vettel pass
Alonso with two wheels on the grass.
Alonso was not penalised 12 months ago but that didn’t stop him from pushing
to have Vettel punished this time.
Jenson
Button, meanwhile, suffered the agony of retiring midway through the
race having reclaimed second place from Massa, who had passed him off the
start line.
After his win at Spa briefly raised hopes he might get back into it, his title
hopes are now as good as over. He tried to remain upbeat afterwards, saying
he was looking forward to getting back in a car which has now won three
races on the trot.
Hamilton was not reaching for the same positives. And even if he is finding
all the speculation hard to handle, it is difficult to sympathise with a
young driver with the world at his feet; a multi-millionaire who will get a
great deal wherever he goes, who had just won for a second time in three
outings to take a giant leap forward in the title race.
Asked if he was happy to have completed a clean sweep of the ‘classic’
circuits, Monza, Silverstone, Spa and Monte Carlo, Hamilton shrugged.
“Of course,” he said. “I don’t really know what else to say. I’m very grateful
to have had the opportunity to score victories with this great team.”
For how much longer?