{"id":22320,"date":"2014-06-20T06:47:03","date_gmt":"2014-06-20T10:47:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/?p=22320"},"modified":"2014-06-20T06:47:03","modified_gmt":"2014-06-20T10:47:03","slug":"mercedes-driver-tension-still-simmering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/formula-1\/mercedes-driver-tension-still-simmering\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercedes driver tension still simmering"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The tension between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg is continuing to simmer on the back boiler.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"ngg-singlepic ngg-left alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/gallery\/f1-2014-rif-images\/f1-2014-drivers\/Lewis-Hamilton-6.jpg\" alt=\"Lewis-Hamilton-6\" width=\"412\" height=\"274\" \/>The pot boiled over spectacularly in Monaco, where Briton Hamilton&#8217;s behaviour was slammed by the media as a &#8216;tantrum&#8217; in the wake of Rosberg&#8217;s controversial qualifying mistake.<\/p>\n<p>It is widely thought team chairman Niki Lauda, a triple world champion with famously vast experience of driver rivalries, stepped in.<\/p>\n<p>But Hamilton told Bild newspaper in Austria: &#8220;Niki does less for our relationship than everyone thinks.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve known Nico since I was 13,&#8221; he said. &#8220;If there are problems, we&#8217;ll talk &#8212; the team doesn&#8217;t have to tell us.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Asked, however, if Lauda phoned him after the Monaco saga, Hamilton admitted: &#8220;He sent me a text message. Then I called him and told him that I did want to talk to Nico.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Nico and I spoke and now everything is good &#8212; which pleases Niki, of course,&#8221; he smiled.<\/p>\n<p>And Toto Wolff, Mercedes team boss, said smiling is a better tactic for Hamilton than was his Monaco tantrum.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Lewis has learned that a sad face does nothing for his image,&#8221; he is quoted by Kleine Zeitung newspaper.<\/p>\n<p>Still, the tension continues to simmer. Rosberg said before travelling to Austria that he thinks his last two results have given him the psychological &#8220;edge&#8221; over Hamilton.<\/p>\n<p>On Thursday, Hamilton hit back: &#8220;It&#8217;s positive he feels that way, even for me.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If he is feeling that way and I beat him anyway, that&#8217;s even better for me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He rejected the theory that Rosberg has managed to pull out a 22-point championship lead due to driving &#8220;smarter&#8221; &#8212; for instance by more successfully nursing an ailing Mercedes car two weeks ago in Canada.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Anyone who says that doesn&#8217;t know the facts,&#8221; Hamilton hit back.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I had more problems with my car because I had less fresh air (for cooling) &#8212; Nico was in more air and so he went to the end,&#8221; he explained.<\/p>\n<p>Smarter or not, F1 legend Sir Stirling Moss on Thursday said he would put his money on Hamilton.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Without a doubt, Lewis is the fastest in formula one,&#8221; he said at a Maserati event in Italy.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a great battle with Nico, because the German is consistent, makes few mistakes, is good with the mechanics &#8212; but Hamilton is undoubtedly faster. I have no doubt about that,&#8221; Moss insisted.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0\u00a9 RIF | GMM<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The tension between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg is continuing to simmer on the back boiler. The pot boiled over spectacularly in Monaco, where Briton Hamilton&#8217;s behaviour was slammed by the media as a &#8216;tantrum&#8217; in the wake of Rosberg&#8217;s controversial qualifying mistake. It is widely thought team chairman Niki Lauda, a triple world champion &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[5262,5340,154,4,598,866,5359],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22320"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22320"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22321,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22320\/revisions\/22321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}