MASVIDAL TO KAM BACK FOR MORE
Hamilton outlines special recipe for recovery
LEWIS HAMILTON won his own psychological battle to bounce back from last week’s misery with victory at the Styrian Grand Prix in Austria.
After romping to one of the finest pole positions of his career in rain-hit qualifying on Saturday, the six-time world champion delivered again in the dry to take his first win of the season.
Such was Hamilton’s dominance that he led from start to finish to take the chequered flag 13.7 seconds ahead of Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas.
Bottas, the winner of the seasonopening Austrian GP at the same Red Bull Ring circuit last week, made it a Silver Arrows one-two with a late-race lunge to edge out Max Verstappen.
To recharge his title defence, Hamilton had to put an error-strewn performance last weekend behind him.
Yesterday he barely worked up a sweat as he kickstarted his quest to equal Michael Schumacher’s record
■ haul of seven world titles. And afterwards he revealed how tough it had been to overcome his demons.
“The last weekend was psychologically challenging,” he said.
“To have the penalties called to the stewards on the Sunday morning just before the race and get a penalty there and then another one in the race – it’s never easy.
“But there is nothing you can do about the past. All you can do is focus and channel your energy to the future. I just made sure I stayed here, trained well, ate well, slept well.”
As soon as the start lights went out and to be yesterday, the Mercedes star showed why he is a winner. The same cannot be said of Ferrari, whose woes continued with yet another nightmare weekend.
The Italian team were left red-faced again after Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel collided on the very
IT LOOKS like it will be ‘Game on’ again after Jorge Masvidal’s unsuccessful attempt to wrestle the UFC welterweight title from Kamaru Usman yesterday.
Miami’s ‘Gamebred’ stepped in with six days’ notice to face the dominant champion at UFC 251 from ‘Fight Island’, the first of four shows from Yas Island in Abu Dhabi.
The ‘Nigerian Nightmare’, who has won all 12 of his UFC fights, controlled the contest to earn a unanimous points victory.
Former street fighter Masvidal, who replaced Gilbert Burns after he contracted coronavirus and had to lose 20lbs to make the 170lb limit, said: “We will do it again and I just can’t wait to come back better. I’m not gonna first lap. Leclerc made an ambitious move to get past his team-mate at Turn Three but got his angles wrong and ended up smashing into Vettel.
The crash marked the second time in four races that the two Ferrari drivers have collided with each other. Leclerc said: “I have apologised, excuses are not enough in times like this.”
That was arguably the standout incident from what was a largely underwhelming race compared to last week’s chaotic season opener – not that Hamilton cares. disappear from the sport without this belt being wrapped around my waist one way or another.
“I wasn’t at my best but everyone can see I have a dog in me but this dog don’t shut up or roll over for nobody.”
Usman, who has now defended the title he won from Tyron Woodley in March 2019 twice, said: “Gamebred is tough and he showed it. He took a lot of big elbows on the bottom but he kept getting up and fighting.
“They call him Gamebred for a reason. He’s always game to fight. I’m just a level better. I have more tools in the toolbox. When I need to pull them out, I can pull them out and use them.”
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