Lewis Hamilton admits he was able to drive “clearly” for the first time in a while over the course of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend, after he returned to his best form en-route to ending a four-month victory drought.
The McLaren driver has had well-documented troubles both on- and off-track during the course of this season, the combination of which have led him to confess on more than one occasion that this has been the worst year of his Formula 1 career.
But on the back of an uplifting weekend in Abu Dhabi when he set the pace in practice, qualified a strong second and then delivered an impressively measured drive to keep Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso at bay to win for the first time in eight races, Hamilton says he was definitely able to be more focused on the job at hand at Yas Marina.
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“I definitely think that this weekend I’ve been clearer in my mind and I’ve had less weighing on me, less thoughts and issues or whatever problems that I’ve got,” he said.
“I was just able to drive clearly. I think my qualifying has always been generally good and my practice has always been pretty good but obviously in the last race I had that mistake [not slowing for yellow flags in practice] which was… I was just not thinking straight and this weekend I was able to think straight.
“I don’t know if that’s because I had some great support here or what, but it’s been a positive feeling all weekend.
“I felt like I was on it all weekend so I just feel very fortunate to have come out and finish and had the car last and not get into any trouble.”
The former champion’s return to the winner’s circle was aided by the bizarre early demise of pole-sitter Sebastian Vettel, who spun off the road at the second corner after his Red Bull picked up an instantaneous puncture.
Hamilton acknowledges a McLaren/Red Bull battle would have been tight, but was more than happy to accept some good fortune for a change.
Asked if the victory would have been more special had he beaten Vettel, he replied: “I don’t know really. I will tell you when it happens. I think we were clearly very quick and it would have been very close.
“Sebastian got a great start – again – and was off. From turn one he got quite a good exit from turn one so he had a pretty good gap already.
“Every now and then, we need a bit of bad luck to notice the good times, I guess, and I don’t remember the last time he had a bit of bad luck.”
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