Lewis Hamilton has apologised to Ferrari’s Felipe Massa for the sixth on-track incident between the two this season.
“I just can’t apologise enough to my team for the negativity that surrounds me nowadays,” Hamilton said.
“I just have to try and keep my head up and recover from this. There is only one guy I generally seem to collide with.
“Before the race, we were standing next to each other – and he hasn’t spoken to me for a long, long time – and I put my arm around him and wished him good luck for the race. I just wanted to quash whatever beef, or any anger he has towards me.
“He gave me a really small acknowledgement. I wasn’t expecting anything more, really.”
McLarean team principal Martin Whitmarsh later described the attraction between Massa and Hamilton when it came to collisions as “magnetic”. Hamilton finished a disappointed seventh place following the incident at the inaugural Indian Grand Prix.
Brazilian Massa shrugged off any offers of friendship with the British driver, albeit in broken English, in a post-race interview, stating: “He just said, ‘Have a good race’. This is trying to what?” Have a good race is not part of talking or whatever.” Indeed…
