British Grand Prix: Lewis Hamilton enjoys his moment in the sun but remains reserved over F1 future

The Briton won a record-equalling fifth victory in his home Grand Prix on Sunday but refused to be drawn on his future

Lewis Hamilton now trails Sebastian Vettel by just one Championship point (Getty)

Lewis Hamilton won big over the weekend at Silverstone and saw arch-rival Sebastian Vettel stumble and lose all but a single point of the 20 -point deficit that he had opened up, but the Briton was in no mood for gloating as he pondered one of the greatest weekends of his racing life.

His record-equalling fifth victory in his home Grand Prix, he admitted, will take time to sink in.

“The legendary part of the weekend, that doesn’t really resonate. That’s something for when you’re older and retired,” he said.

“But I come back to my room [at Mercedes] and it’s good to sit there… When you set yourself a goal and you do it and succeed, you have this belief in yourself and you extract whatever it is you have inside of you… I don’t know why I am able to drive the way I drive, but it feels such a blessing.

“Apart from when I’m with my family, the happiest I am is when I have the car on the knife edge. That’s never really changed.”

While refusing to be drawn on the subject of when he might start discussing a new contract with Mercedes, to extend the current one which runs out at the end of 2018, he continued: “I can’t really say what will happen about my future because you never know in life, but I can say that I am loving racing, and really feeling within myself that I am driving better than ever.

“I’ve said that in the past, but right now I am at my best and want to stay there. I prepare myself the best I can and only I know how I can do that. I have a great team around me, such a long, long chain [of people], operating at its most efficient, and I want to continue with that.

“I’m always going to like driving and doing crazy stuff, and even if I get another championship, it will never be a case of wanting to hang up my gloves. I’ll always want to win more even when I do stop. But let’s just focus at the moment try and get that fourth.”

Indeed, prospects of a fourth Championship title came firmly back into focus yesterday after the disappointments of Baku and Austria. But despite his domination at Silverstone, he still believes there is little to choose still between Mercedes and Ferrari as a gripping season reaches its mid-point.

Lewis Hamilton celebrates with fans after winning his fifth Silverstone title (Getty)

“I think there are pros and cons with teams in terms of performance,” he added. “Some weekends they are a bit ahead, some we are, so it’s track dependent. Still, at the moment they have the strongest line-up, while he [Vettel] is still one point ahead. But collectively as a team we are leading the Constructors’ Championship. So it’s been kind of level.

"Our car has been a little trickier to get used to and to start with the right set-up. We didn't get it in the perfect window and didn't exploit its performance earlier in the year, but Ferrari really hit the nail on the head from the beginning. But with a lot of work, a lot of analysis, we've started to move forwards, particularly in the last two races, and started off immediately on the right foot.

"Our qualifying pace is looking strong, and here our race pace was a lot higher than Ferrari's, probably for the first time this season. That's very good to see.

"This weekend we've been able to exploit the full performance of our car more so than any other race we've done this year. It gives us a strong platform to start from for the second half of the season.”


 Hamilton in action at Silverstone 
 (Getty)

The 32 year-old denied that was a relief, however. "I wasn't looking for a relief, and I don't feel like it's a relief," he said. "Points-wise, it's nice to be only one behind, but when I came across the line, winning my home grand prix was the most important thing - and also the way we did it throughout the whole weekend. That's the thing I'm solely focusing on right now.

“In the next days and the next race, we will be in a much stronger position strategy-wise not to have that points deficit. Obviously the pendulum swung our way this weekend, but there are lots more things that can come up.”

When asked how he can drive the way he does at Silverstone, Hamilton brought a moment of light humour to his press conference as he insisted: “Because I own it!”

“People are going to think I’m biased,” he continued, “but though I love a lot of tracks this has grown to be one of my favourites. Monaco is another, but it’s not a great race track. This is. It has a great combination of high-speed corners.

Hamilton has won at Silverstone a record-equalling five times (Getty)

“This is a balls-out race circuit that has character and history. In terms of driving it, I started in 2002 on the national circuit in Formula 3. I go well here and I think I’m good at this track. But then I think of the energy I get from these fans. There is no other driver gets that kind of energy anywhere, and I really do think it boosts you. It just lifts you up, there is no avoiding it.

“Literally from before the start of the race, before I even got into the car, I could see the crowd. Every time I turned I could I see them. We did the start, I was accelerating down to Turn 3 and out of the corner of my eye I could see all these guys cheering. When I got to Turn 7, everyone was standing up, cheering. Every lap. For 51 laps. Every single one. They didn’t miss one. It just felt like they were egging me on. You never see that anywhere else in world, so I think that’s a real big part of it.

“Our team have been re-energised, they’ve definitely absorbed all the energy from the fans, and hopefully we can take that into the next race, in Hungary.”