hamilton furious with stewards

Lewis Hamilton hit out at Monaco Grand Prix race stewards after being penalised for over-aggressive driving during the race.

Hamilton was given a drive-through penalty for causing an avoidable incident with Felipe Massa while the pair disputed 10th place.

He was then informed following the race that another incident - a collision with Pastor Maldonado's Williams - was being investigated.

"Out of six races, I've been to the stewards five times. It's a joke," Hamilton told the BBC. "It's an absolute frickin' joke."

When asked why he thought stewards had been paying attention to his driving this year, he joked: "Maybe it's because I'm black. That's what Ali G says. I don't know."

Hamilton said that he had not been to blame for the Massa incident, which occurred at the Loews hairpin on lap 34 as the two - and Mark Webber's Red Bull made contact.

"I was quite a lot quicker than Massa," he added. "I went up the inside, and the guy turned so early and just turned into me. So I tried to go over the kerb to avoid him and we were stuck together.

"And of course I get the penalty, which is usual. He [Massa] held me up in qualifying and I got the penalty. He turned into me, and I got the penalty."

He also denied that he was at fault for causing Maldonado to crash at Ste. Devote with three laps remaining in the race as the pair battled for sixth spot.

"I went up the inside of Maldonado and you can see on the [TV] screen that he turned in a good car length too early to stop me overtaking him and he crashed into me.

"It's just ridiculous. These drivers are absolutely frickin' ridiculous. Just stupid."

Hamilton's sixth place came after a frustrating weekend on which he had set the pace in the first two parts of qualifying, but then been caught out by McLaren's strategy in Q3 before he was dropped to ninth on the grid for missing the chicane on his best lap.

After being mired in the midfield for the whole race, he said that his determination to overtake rivals would not be dimmed by the events of the grand prix.

"It's not hurting my confidence as a driver. I just think the sport is... People want to see my racing, want to see overtaking and [then] you get done for trying to overtake. You get done trying to put on a show. You get done trying to make a move.

"Fair play, if I really feel that I've gone too late and hit someone, I'll put my hand up and realise [that] I really have caused an incident and I've been the stupid one, but it is not the case [today]."

Hamilton's result retained his second place in the championship, but dropped him to 58 points behind leader Sebastian Vettel, who won the race.

to the read the idiot's comments click here


on the massa incident: he complains massa turned in, im pretty sure that what's you suppose to do to go round the corner
on the maldonado incident: he went for a stupid maneuver into turn 1 and went into maldonado and caused maldonado to retire from the race.

ive seen better driving from gp2 drivers then what lewis did today.

Lewis should have been disqualified. He caused 2 if not 3 crashes today.

Fine him and ban him I say

hamilton given 20 second penalty.

he keeps 6th place

talk about pointless

LH is too hot headed and competitive sometimes to his own detriment!!! His bad quali, put him in the wrong place on the grid. He could see Jenson flying ahead and leading the race in the same car, I guess this made him impatient. He is more agressive, and needs to start keeping a cool head, as he has the drive and ability to win from behind. I think he should not intimidate lower team drivers, am glad Maldonado did not easily give up his position, this is racing.
The penalty is harsh, why not a drive through yesterday! now he is already 20sec behind and in Canada!!! I bet he may hit the wall of champions there again...

Today Lewis Hamilton has apologised to Felipe Massa and Pastor Maldonado for any offence caused by his comments after the race, when he complained about them not giving him room when he attempted to overtake and indeed for turning in on him.

mm15 wrote:
The penalty is harsh, why not a drive through yesterday! now he is already 20sec behind and in Canada!!! I bet he may hit the wall of champions there again...

Calm down dear

No 20 seconds in Canada, no hitting the wall of champions
You are thinking of a grid drop, time panalties are retrospectively applied

You are too hot headed and need to calm down dear

Hamilton was fairly penalised and was out of order, having a go at the stewards. They do get decisions right more often than not, after all.

That said, I found his Ali G reference amusing and I'm glad he wasn't taken to task over it. Good to see he's maintaining some of his sense of humour, despite his problems.

Think McLaren deserve the brunt of his outburst for the VERY late pit call and for not letting him out earlier in Q3 to get a "banker" lap in, on a circuit that is notorious for crashes.

Hamilton is not "an idiot". He had a bad weekend, which wasn't all his fault (the qualifying chicken-up) and he was frustrated so said stupid things. We all do it.

And to be fair, he was quite rightly pulled in front of the stewards this weekend - but at other times this season it has been a joke. You can't punish a bit of competetive spirit.

He didn't have to apologise it either, did he? If Schumacher had made the same mistake, I doubt he would have come out and said sorry to everyone affected.

I think Lewis needs to just cool down a bit and look at the film of the incident with Massa - Felipe wasn't looking to defend his position from Lewis, but was trying to turn inside Webber ahead after Mark ran in deep to the hairpin. Unfortunately, this coincided with Lewis trying a late braking overtake on the inside of Massa. Ironic considering that 2 corners later Lews got so much better drive than Massa that he could pass through the tunnel

The Maldonado pass was a bit more 50/50, as Lewis had already made a similar manoveure stick on Schumacher, but Maldonado didn't have the same awareness to hold off the turn in, so made contact. A bit too forceful an overtake given the situation in the race at that point and the normal difficulties of getting past at Monaco.

Its funny as Schumacher had crash after crash in various races, Turkey the latest and people werent moaning when he didnt get disqualified. Come on guys be consistant with your convictions.

Massa may have had a point when LH tried to pass him. BUt maldonado incident, Lewis was along side him into the first corner.

Also all this kicking off from Massa, i would expect him to have something to say about it, but i woudlnt be suprised if the Ferrari PR machine is running in full on top gear, getting massa to make more of a big deal out of it.

The comments by Lewis are absolutely appalling! When somebody fails to accept the blame for rule breaking, how do you expect them to follow the same rules in future?

Jean Todt needs to have a chat with Lewis - his driving was unacceptable and I believe should have resulted in either a race suspension or a 5 place grid drop for the next race.

His comments are in danger of bringing the sport into disrepute, contravening article 151c. The FIA should not allow Hamilton, or any driver for that matter, to get away with such comments.

What a load of tosh. As i said above drivers in the passed have had a race where they've collided numerous times and no one seems to bat an eye lid and i might add it being on a track where overtaking is possible. But suddenly its a problem when Lewis has 2 incidents in monaco - where we all know overtaking is impossible.

I agree Lewis should have been careful what he said in the interview.