Lewis Hamilton: “I never wanted to collide with anyone”

The Mercedes driver had been in second tailing Max Verstappen for the majority of the race before teammate Valtteri Bottas’ retirement brought out a safety car.

Hamilton was ordered to do the opposite of Verstappen who pitted leaving the Briton in the lead but was passed at the restart before the Ferrari collision brought out another safety car with only a few laps to go.

The Briton strangely pitted for fresh tyres and had to fight with Albon for second, eventually bumping into the side trying to overtake and spinning him off.

"It was a great race, I thoroughly enjoyed it and it was hopefully fun for people to watch, although the result is upsetting,” Hamilton said.

“I never want to collide with anyone, it was really unfortunate with Alex. Naturally I take it on me, it was my fault, I was coming from behind.

“He was doing a great job, so apologies to him. I gave it absolutely everything and more today, I was pushing so hard in every lap just to keep up with Max in front of me.

“We really didn’t have a lot of pace today and I think we were probably going faster than we should have gone.”

Hamilton praised Red Bull for their result though as he was classified seventh place after a five-second time penalty from third for the collision with Albon.

“Congratulations to Red Bull, they did the better job today and deserved the win. They were extremely quick today, I was basically a sitting duck on the straights,” he added.

“There’s one more race to go in this season, so we will be pushing for a better result in Abu Dhabi."