Lewis Hamilton apologised to Sky Sports F1 for spiky interview

David Croft has revealed that Lewis Hamilton apologised to Sky Sports F1 colleague Rachel Brookes following his downbeat interview after the Spanish Grand Prix.

The seven-time world champion was extremely down after he struggled for pace on his way to a disappointing sixth-place finish in Sunday’s race at Barcelona and gave short responses in both the TV and written media pen.

Hamilton was told to move aside for faster Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc early on and his performance alarmingly dropped off following a late Safety Car. He was overtaken by Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg and finished seventh on the road, but was promoted to P6 thanks to Max Verstappen’s penalty.

Afterwards, Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur told media including Crash.net that Hamilton’s car had developed a problem in the closing stages but would not say what the issue was.

“He was massively down when he was talking to Rachel Brookes and actually apologised to Rachel for being so down when the cameras stopped rolling,” Croft told Sky Sports News.

“It’s not going as well as Lewis would have hoped. It’s certainly not going as well as Ferrari would have hoped. Lewis didn’t know that there was damage on his car and there was something wrong with his car.

“Ferrari haven’t been too specific as yet with exactly what was wrong. I’m sure once he gets a chance to debrief with the team that will improve his mood a little bit in that it’s not him.

“And I don’t think it is him. You don’t stop becoming the greatest racing driver overnight, and I do think Lewis Hamilton is the best Formula 1 driver of all time. You might lose a little bit of sharpness once you get to 40 and in qualifying that might become more apparent but you certainly don’t lose your racecraft.

“His performance in Imola, making up for being 12th on the grid, his performance in Monaco, and his performance in the sprint weekend in China shows he has still got that racecraft and can still come through the field.

“But if you are driving with one wheel tied behind your back then you are not going to produce the kind of results we’ve seen from Lewis Hamilton in Barcelona before. It’s a track he’s gone really, really well at.

“Canada is another track where Lewis has gone specularly well at over the years, so maybe getting back to what you love and what you know will be a huge boost for Lewis.

“And we keep our fingers crossed because nobody wants to see Lewis Hamilton not being competitive. We want to see some of the moves which have thrilled us over the years.”

What did Hamilton say in his Sky interview?

A despondent Hamilton put the blame on himself in the aforementioned interview with Sky, in which he gave very short answers.

"Not particularly, it was not a great day,” he said.

Asked about the strategy, Hamilton replied: “The strategy was good, the team did a great job. That’s it.”

Brookes then replied saying “I hate seeing you in this mood,” to which Hamilton retorted: “Well what do you want me to say? I just had a really bad day and I’ve got nothing to say.

“It was a difficult day, there’s nothing else to add to it, it was terrible. There’s no point explaining it, it’s not your fault, I just don’t know what else to say.”

Attempting to console Hamilton, Brookes suggested Ferrari would find answers for his struggles.

But Hamilton was having none of it, responding: “I'm sure they won't, the answer is probably just me.”

It has now emerged that Hamilton apologised to Brookes for his conduct after the cameras were switched off.