Simon Fuller, Hamilton’s manager, was also present in the McLaren motor home
and was likely to have been consulted. But it was clear from Hamilton’s
initial reaction that he is weary of the quarrel with Massa and desperately
wants to put both it and the season behind him.
“Disappointed would be an understatement,” he said of a race in which he
started fifth and then recovered from the Massa incident to finish seventh,
five places below team-mate Jenson
Button who now leads him by 38 points with two races remaining.
“We were clearly quick enough — Jenson did a great job. I just can’t apologise
enough to my team for the negativity that surrounds me nowadays.” Hamilton
cannot catch a break at the moment.
After his encouraging second in Korea last time out, he had arrived in India
determined to put his recent woes behind him. He said his main goal was to
put his high-profile split with American pop star Nicole Scherzinger out of
his mind and stay “focused on business”.
Yet it was almost inevitable, from the moment he closed in on Massa’s Ferrari
after 23 laps of yesterday’s inaugural Indian Grand Prix, that the pair
would end up colliding. Their cars seem almost magnetically attracted to one
another this year.
Hamilton has been far from blameless — earning two drive-through penalties to
Massa’s one — but yesterday he was deeply unfortunate.
Attempting to pass Massa up the inside into turn five, he looked to have done
enough only for the Brazilian to turn in on him. The stewards sided with
Hamilton and awarded Massa a drive-through penalty, which the Ferrari driver
felt was harsh.
Asked whether there was bad blood between himself and the Briton, Massa added:
“Maybe for him. Because all the incidents are that he touched my car. I have
nothing against him. Zero. Zero.” Hamilton also denied that he held any
grudge, saying his major concern was cutting out the mistakes which are
costing him, such as his failure to slow down under double yellow flags in
practice, which resulted in him dropping from second to fifth on the grid.
“I should have been second on the grid and I wouldn’t have been anywhere near
Felipe if that was the case,” he said. “But [as for Felipe] no, before the
race, during the minute’s silence we were standing next to each other — and
he hasn’t spoken to me for a long, long time — and I put my arm around him
and wished him good luck for the race. He hasn’t spoken to me for months
now, so I just wanted to quash whatever beef, or any anger he has towards
me. I still have respect for him.”
Whitmarsh said the pair needed to sort it out between themselves.
“They’re young drivers but they’re not that young. They’re men. I have
discussed it with Ferrari but I think it’s got to come from them. If I
arranged for the two of them to shake hands outside the garage you would all
take a picture and have a laugh about it.
“I think Felipe is under enormous pressure within that team and that causes
him to react. And in truth Lewis will be feeling under pressure because of
the great performance of Jenson at the moment.
“But a staged handshake… you don’t want that, unless it’s to take the mickey
out of it. They’ve got to sort it out themselves.”