McLaren won’t ask Lewis Hamilton to change his driving style despite recent results which have seen him fail to finish four races in this season.
Principal race engineer, Phil Prew, believes the 2008 champions “high-risk” approach has been to blame for some of his incidents, but refused to ask the 26-year-old to calm down as his style ultimately gives results.
“Lewis has had an up and down season,” said Prew during a Vodafone McLaren-Mercedes phone-in. “Lewis is a great driver who has won races this year and has won races every year that he’s driven for McLaren and he’s always pushing very hard.
“Obviously he came in to the season with great hopes of winning the championship and that’s going to be an upward struggle from here – very difficult to achieve now – and I think his pushing hard brings some consequences of high risk. I think that’s what we’re seeing.
“We will not ask him to change; Lewis is Lewis and Lewis gets results out of a very charging and aggressive approach and we fully support that. We’ve seen that has won him a championship and that’s ultimately our intention. I think it should also be noted that Lewis is a very clever guy, he’s a very good racing driver and he will reflect on the difficulties he’s had this year and to come back stronger he knows what it takes to win championships and that’s our intention still.”
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