Belgian GP: Hamilton Clarifies 'Ferrari Tricks' Comment After Vettel Cruised To Victory

Lewis Hamilton seemed to accuse Ferrari of having some tricks up their sleeve with regard to their engine performance in the immediate aftermath of the Belgian Grand Prix on Sunday, but later clarified he did not mean they were doing anything illegal.

Sebastian Vettel cruised to victory after overtaking the Mercedes driver on the opening lap and the British racer and his team were surprised as to how quick the Ferrari was on the straights. Hamilton admitted they were “blitzed” and urged his team to continue to push harder to close the gap.

The Mercedes and Ferrari teams brought upgraded engines for the race in Belgium and looked almost on par during practice and qualifying with the latter having a slight edge on the straights. But the true difference was revealed during the race, when Vettel, after failing to pass Hamilton at the start, sailed past him on the Kemmel straight in the opening lap with relative ease — he eventually finished the race 11 seconds ahead of the Mercedes driver.

“Yeah, congratulations to Seb. We did everything we could, I did everything I could in the race and I think we ultimately performed quite well this weekend, but he drove past me like I wasn’t even there on the straights. So we’ve got to keep pushing as hard as we can to try to catch up but, you know, that’s all I can say,” Hamilton said immediately after the race before the podium celebrations, according to F1.com.

“I think I could have but again he would have sailed past me on the straight. They’ve got a few trick things going on in the car. I did what I could, we did what we could and we’ve just got to keep working,” he added.

The Mercedes driver’s comments during his post-race interview were immediately picked up and he was questioned about the same during the FIA Drivers’ press conference. He made it clear instantly that he did not insinuate that Ferrari were doing something illegal to garner extra performance from their power unit.

Hamilton believes both the teams have some tricks of their own, but Ferrari are just a bit ahead at the moment. But he continued to insist that "trick" meant something special and not illegal after he was asked if Mercedes will be speaking to the FIA about Ferrari’s sudden surge to the front in terms of having the best power unit on the grid.

“No, we all have trick things on our cars. Trick is just a word for something special, I guess. Just something special. I don’t know. I don’t know what’s on their car so I couldn't tell you either way,” Hamilton said clarifying his earlier comments. “I’m not saying that there’s anything illegal on. I’m just saying we all have something trick. There’s probably something trick on… Trick is just something that helps you bring that extra bit of performance. That’s all I mean. I don’t mean anything to it so please don’t read into it and please don’t twist my words and say that I say they’re doing anything illegal because they’re not,” he continued to insist after the question of FIA being involved was raised."

“They just outperformed us today and we’ve got to work harder, but there are things that they have on the car that we might not have on the car and vice versa and we’ve got to try and find out what and improve on that. That’s it,” he added.