Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he backed off the throttle massively following the sudden punctures of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel at the British Grand Prix. In the last three laps of the race, the two drivers were forced to pit for new tyres. Raikkonen's failure happened first, dropping him out of the podium places before Vettel's failure occurred.
Vettel was running in P3 before his failure, which occurred on the run into Brooklands, meaning the German had to do around half a lap on a punctured tyre. Hamilton admits he played it safe after he heard about the problems of the Maranello squad.
"The team said generally it wouldn't be a problem," the Brit told reporters, "but blistering did appear. "Then I heard about the blow-ups and I backed off. I went basically to half or sixty percent throttle everywhere, so I was really slow the last two laps. I was basically three or four seconds off the pace. I just wanted to bring it home," he said. "I had a 19-second gap so fortunately, I could have gone slower, but I didn't feel I needed to."
Fergal Walsh
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Bahrain International Circuit - Winter testing
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