Of the suspension failure, he said: “I was trying my best with it, but it
was very hard. We have races like this, I guess.”
He added: “In terms of winning the world championship, logic suggests
that that’s probably it for me. Having said that, there are a lot of points
still up for grabs, so I’ll keep pushing. Stranger things have happened, and
I’ll never give up.”
Hamilton is fourth in the drivers’ standings on 153 points, while Button has
131. Vettel tops the lot with 215 points with four races to go.
Button only qualified 11th quickest on Saturday and his good start in the race
was wrecked when Kamui Kobayashi came flying down the inside, smashing into
Button and destroying his suspension.
“I’ve just been hit by Kobayashi. What an idiot!” the McLaren driver
and 2009 world champion exclaimed over the team radio.
“It’s extremely disappointing. This is a long race, with so much
opportunity for everyone. It’s a great circuit for overtaking, so it’s
surprising to see people behaving like that on the first lap,” he said
of Kobayashi.
“I no longer have a realistic chance to win the world championship, so
I’ll be enjoying myself over the final four races. Scoring points for the
team in the constructors’ world championship will be the most important
priority, so I’ll be focusing on picking up as many as I possibly can.”
Martin Whitmarsh, McLaren team principal, looked on the bright side.
“Lewis may have scored only a single world championship point this
afternoon, but I’m happy to be quoted as saying that it was probably the
hardest won and most heroically fought world championship point in McLaren’s
long history,” he said.
“As for Jenson, well, what can I say? He made a very good start and
would, I’m sure, have driven a great race this afternoon.
“But he wasn’t given the chance to show what he could have done because
he was taken out, hit from behind, through no fault of his own.”