Lewis Hamilton has praised Charles Leclerc for his racing discipline after the duo endured an intense battle at the British Grand Prix.
Hamilton says that it was vastly different to his experience in 2021, when he was involved in a number of on-track incidents with title rival Max Verstappen.
The seven-time World Champion and Verstappen had one of their various collisions at last year’s race at Silverstone, with Verstappen retiring on the opening lap of the race.
The incident happened at the high-speed Copse corner, however both Leclerc and Hamilton went side-by-side through the same section at the 2022 edition of the race without making contact.
Hamilton eventually moved ahead of Leclerc for the final spot on the podium and took time to praise the Monegasque driver after the race.
“Charles did a great job, what a great battle,” he told Sky F1. “He is a very sensible driver – clearly a lot different to what I experienced last year.
“At Copse for example, the two of us went through there with no problem. What a battle.
“We had to have a tyre deficit to get past him. Really, really amazing weekend.”
Hamilton looked to be on course for his first grand prix win of the 2022 season before a Safety Car neutralised the race with 10 laps to go.
The 37-year-old admits that he was eyeing up taking the top step of the podium, but says that matters went against him and the Mercedes team on Sunday.
“For a while it [the race win] was feeling on,” Hamilton said. “A bunch of things went against us.
“The start, we got up to third then they put us back to fifth. Then I lost ground to Lando [Norris], so I spent a bunch of laps trying to get past him.
“Then the gap was five or six seconds to the Ferraris. But I was doing good time, catching them up, I did a good long stint and I thought: ‘Yes, maybe we can fight for a win here.’
“But unfortunately the gap was too big and the pitstop was not very quick. At the end, I just struggled with the warm-up and lost out to two cars. It was so tough today.”
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