World champion Hamilton keeps his foot down in Sao Paulo
Lewis Hamilton began his championship-winning parade in dominant fashion after he completed a practice double for the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Hamilton, who has a fourth star on his crash helmet this weekend to represent his latest world title triumph, arrived here in Sao Paulo in the spotlight following claims that he had avoided a £3.3 million VAT charge on his private jet.
But the 32-year-old Englishman put his off-track troubles firmly to one side to end both sessions at the summit of the order ahead of his Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas.
After sealing the championship with three rounds to spare back in 2015, Hamilton lost the final races to bitter rival Nico Rosberg – a momentum the German carried over to his title-winning campaign last year. But Hamilton has vowed not to make the same mistake this year and started the penultimate weekend of the season in imperious form.
After going fastest in the opening session, Hamilton returned to the track yesterday afternoon to post a best lap of one minute and 09.515 seconds to edge out team-mate Bottas by just five hundredths of a second on a strong day for Mercedes.
Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo, who is set to serve a ten-place grid penalty following a series of changes to his Renault engine, was third fastest, a quarter-of-a-second shy of Hamilton with Sebastian Vettel next.
Vettel, who led the majority of this year’s championship battle before his charge imploded in the Far East, faces a battle to finish the season as best of there st behind Hamiltonwith bot ta snow breathing down his neck.