Lewis may never get over the agony of Abu Dhabi
Wolff fears finale farce may affect ace Hamilton forever
LEWIS HAMILTON will “never get over” Sunday’s controversial race in Abu Dhabi and could even decide to walk away now from Formula One.
That was the verdict of the British racer’s Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff, as the season finale farce took a new twist.
On a day when Mercedes decided to withdraw their final right to appeal the outcome that saw Hamilton denied a record eighth world title by Max Verstappen on a last-lap rule-change decision, Wolff claimed his driver had been shattered by the outcome.
Wolff said: “It is going to take a long time to digest what has happened on Sunday. I don’t think we will ever get over it, that’s not possible.
“I would very much hope that Lewis continues racing because he’s the greatest driver of all time.
“We will be working through the events over the next weeks and months and, as a racer, his heart will say ‘I need to continue’ because he is at the peak of his game.
“But we have to overcome the pain that was caused upon him on Sunday, also because he is a man with clear values and it is difficult for him to understand how it happened.
“I just have to do the utmost that I can to help him overcome this.”
Wolff is a man who engineers highly-tuned racing cars to precision for a living.
He heads up a team of thousands who are drilled to strive for perfection in their daily working lives.
So when he chooses words like “sitting duck” and “robbed”, they are not offered by chance. They are crafted to have impact by a man who does everything with reason and meaning.
His visibly-combustible anger at the Yas Marina circuit in Abu Dhabi on Sunday, as race director Michael Masi’s last-gasp controversial ruling saw the world championship clawed from Hamilton’s tight grip, was understandable in the heat of battle.
But four days later Wolff said: “It wasn’t just a bad call, it was a freestyle reading of the rules and it left Lewis like a sitting duck.
“His driving in the last four races was faultless. He had a commanding lead on Sunday in Abu Dhabi from the get-go.
“We believe we had a very strong case and if you looked at it from the legal side how it would have been judged in a regular court it is almost guaranteed we would have won. But the problem with the FIA is the way it’s structured.”