After a tough drive to 11th, Button said: “I am sure there are mind games
going on. Was Lewis that slow in Saturday morning practice? I don’t know.
There were a few things he played on me.”
Partly because of his hero Ayrton Senna’s dominance in Monte Carlo, Hamilton
has always placed extra value on what remains the jewel in Formula One’s
crown. He had huge success on the street circuit in the junior formulas, and
in his first two years in Formula One, but he has not been on the podium
since he won in 2008.
“Monaco and Silverstone are the two real ones that you point out [before the
start of the year],” Hamilton said. “Last year, I finally had a car to win,
and I drove like a w—–. I don’t mean the whole race. I drove well until
the safety car pit stop area, I was just struggling with the car last year.
I lost three tenths at the first corner.
“Obviously going there this year I’m thinking ‘I’ve struggled this weekend,
I’ve got to think how I can avoid that,’ otherwise, I will be quick there.”
Meanwhile, with Ferrari
continuing to struggle, F1’s rumour mill was in full swing in Barcelona amid
suggestions that the Italian team are again chasing Red Bull’s Adrian Newey,
widely acknowledged as the premier designer in the sport.
The approach is certainly plausible, given Ferrari’s travails, but would Newey
leave Red Bull? He has addressed the subject before and said there is only
one team for him. Christian Horner, Red Bull’s team principal, agrees.
“It is an annual thing that there is speculation about Adrian’s future but he
has made his feelings clear to me about the team,” Horner said. “He has
paternal feelings towards the team and he is much more involved than he has
been and he enjoys the environment he works in.
“The speculation is purely that. You can understand why Ferrari would be
looking.”
Elsewhere, Ferrari’s former team principal Jean Todt, who is now president of
the FIA, said proposals made by the sport’s biggest teams to cut costs were
a “joke”.
“We know the budgets are between $100 million and $400 million,” Todt said.
“The proposals that they seem happy with are to reduce budgets by $2
million, which is ridiculous.”