Hamilton promises to 'keep close eye' on Red Bull after surprise Verstappen win
Monday, 10 August 2020
The Briton is wary of the Red Bull threat.
Lewis Hamilton was excited by Max Verstappen's surprise win at the 70th Anniversary Grand Prix but insists Mercedes will not take their success for granted.
Hamilton has dominated Formula 1®, winning the past three drivers' championships, and the Mercedes superstar leads the standings again in 2020.
However, the Briton missed out on a fourth race win in succession and a second in two weeks at Silverstone on Sunday.
With Mercedes' tyres blistering in the heat, Verstappen's Red Bull car thrived in the conditions and he triumphed to move second for the year, 30 points behind Hamilton.
Defending champion Hamilton welcomed the challenge, though, telling a post-race news conference: "I think it's great.
"As I said before, I want to have races where they're challenging - like today - so I'm excited to watch this race.
Now whilst we didn’t get the result we’d hoped for, that was such a challenge out there. I actually really enjoyed the struggle. To come back at the end was fun, not enough to stop Max who did a great job today but enough to get good points. Lots to learn from today. #BritishGP pic.twitter.com/rgw6mgSuxD
— Lewis Hamilton (@LewisHamilton) August 9, 2020
"Obviously the Red Bull seems to be quite close in race conditions to us and obviously today is stronger, so it shows they don't have as bad a package as perhaps people had said in the past
"But I think it's good. It will be interesting to see the progression through the rest of the year and I definitely will not overlook them.
"I think we've got to keep a close eye on them and keep working to push forwards, because I don't think it's going to be easy by any means.
"But I don't think my team has that mentality anyway, so we just keep our heads down.
"I was hopeful today that maybe we would have – wishful thinking - some sort of race towards the end, but maybe in the future we will get to have some, a bit more."
