LEWIS HAMILTON has written off his hopes of a record eighth world title after slumping to a 14th place finish in the Imola sprint race.
The Brit is now a whopping 50 points behind championship leader Charles Leclerc, who was runner up to Max Verstappen in the 30-minute race.
Lewis Hamilton has written off his chances of winning an eighth F1 title
Hamilton’s miserable race means he starts Sunday’s GP from outside the top 10 for the second time this season, as his Mercedes team continue to struggle.
Hamilton said: “It is difficult for sure but I am not the only one in the team. We are all feeling the pain and riding this out together.
“We are doing the best we can with what we have. We are nowhere near where we want to be but we will keep fighting and hope to see light at the end of the tunnel.
“Of course I want to be fighting for the world championship but that is not the case and we have to face the reality.
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“I have seen a couple of comments from certain individuals I respected but their comments are a bunch of nonsense all designed to get headlines and make themselves relevant.
“But I am 100 percent committed to this team, just because we have hit a rough patch, it is not in my DNA to walk away.
“We are the world champions and will have to ride it out whether that will be this year or next year.”
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff was pictured having a heated discussion with his driver but insists he has no concerns that Hamilton will quit.
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The 37-year-old, who is involved in talks to buy Chelsea as part of a consortium, still has a contract with the Silver Arrows until the end of 2023.
And Wolff expects him to honour that deal and says he is committed to helping the team turn their poor performance around after admitting this week was a “write off”.
He added: “We shared the frustration that we were not able to extract performance and how annoying it was.
“It was the same point of view and sheer anger and there is no blaming. Nobody in the team is anywhere near enjoying the ride at the moment.
“We have done it in the past and we have to dig ourselves out of the hole.”
Hamilton’s problems continued at Imola
And in more worrying news Wolff says the sprint race in Imola marks the team’s lowest point of the season so far as they struggle with the pace of their car.
He said: “Today marks the low of these first four races and it is obvious we are not anywhere near the fight at the front.
“It would be completely unrealistic to have a slot amongst the front runners fighting for the championship.
“We have to acknowledge we have frustration rather than painting an optimistic picture and that is not an easy endeavour.
“We have a direction where we know we can unlock the potential in the car that would bring us closer, but at the moment we have not got the key.
“We have to look at the avenues immediately but I see no change in the passion for sorting this out and getting back in the game and winning championships.
“Points scoring needs to be the minimum [in the race], but this is not where we set our expectations and therefore this weekend is a complete write-off.”
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Verstappen will start on pole for Sunday’s race after he passed Leclerc on the final lap of the 30-minute race F1 has introduced to spice up the action.
But aside from the final lap overtake by the Dutchman, with the use of DRS, it was an otherwise dull half an hour.
