Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P5 [without his penalty] at the Italian GP | 10.09.22

“I just failed so badly in trying to explain aerodynamics! They asked me about the aerodynamics and I was trying to explain and I realised I'm really not an aerodynamicist!"

Lewis on ‘this thing’ the W13

Lewis. Understand you've got to go and see the stewards. I think this may be related – you might be able to confirm – whether it's to do with your nose stud. I've noticed you've got your piercing in. Could you tell us: did you forget? Is it on purpose? Are you making a point? I'd also like to follow it up: Charles, I've noticed you're wearing a ring. You either got married or have you just put this on before coming up here?

CL: I think when you get married it’s on the left?

Q: Well, normally yes… 

CL: No, no, nothing to do with this. LH: You’re allowed to wear it if you’re married. CL: Are you!? LH: *giggles* Yeah! 

Q: But if he’s not are you in breach if you were wearing it in the car?

CL: No, no, I wasn't. I always take them off and put them on again once it’s done.

Q: Lewis?

LH: I was not trying to make a statement. No. Basically we had this… obviously, I've had this… my jewellery and my nose stud for years. And obviously, we had that whole commotion at the beginning of the year. At the time it was, like soldered in. So it didn't come lose. They gave me at the time, for many races, they gave me, not therapeutic use, but like an exemption, until I could find a solution. And then went and got it taken out and tried to find solution, put it in and put it out. It got infected because of that. And I was just continuing on with this infection. And I had a blood blister and I was going on about it. So just had quite a sore on my nose. Then I went back and saw the… this is all stuff I've told them before qualifying. And then went back and had to have the… disgustingly, but the blood blister fixed because there was like pus and blood and stuff. And then put this in and the last two weeks it’s started to heal and they've asked that I keep it in. So it's crazy that we're obviously having to talk about something so small. I take everything else out. And yeah, at this point, I don't really care to be honest.

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P5 in Abu Dhabi | 19.11.22

“I don’t know if it’s misleading, I mean, got a 1-2 so…” “All the problems we’ve had [oscillate]. It’s obviously track specific. We thought that this was would be a difficult race for us but, through the weekend so far, we weren’t looking like we were 8 tenths down so a bit of a surprising qualifying to be so far behind them. 6 tenths of that just on the straight so. Otherwise I gave it everything and looking forward to the end tomorrow.” “Well bouncing is back with vengeance. Shoot! *giggle* ,Yeah so bouncing is back and that’s definitely losing us time. Otherwise we just pretty slow on the straights. I had some brake problems, we’ve had it for most of the year. The brake discs separate in brake temperature so when you hit the brakes the car pulls to one direction. When you go into Turn 5 the car is pulling to the right and it’s a left hand corner and it’s not ideal.”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P6 in Japan | 08.10.22

“We were losing a lot of time on the straights but the car was feeling really good else, throughout the rest of the lap so. It was fun, my last [lap] was generally good. I didn’t have any problems otherwise. I think we’re losing 5 or 6 tenths just on the straight. We kind of anticipated it going in, we have a bigger wing than the other guys so yea. That’s about it.

On tomorrow: “It depends on the conditions that we have. If it rains I think we didn’t look too bad yesterday in the wet conditions. I think either way we should be a little closer than we were today. Just hoping for a better race result.”

Win possible? “That’s a real reach to try and say that we can get a win. Those guys are 9 tenths ahead. You don’t from being 9 tenths behind in qualify to win a race.”

Lewis Hamilton post race interview with Sky Sports | 01.10.22 Natalie: "Nose ring is back in, how come?" Lewis: "It got infected loads of times when I was trying to find a solution, I went back to the clinic and that's the best way for it to heel. For me it's a health part, that's the way it's gonna stay and they'll have to deal with it."

Lewis Hamilton post race interview after qualifying P3 during the Mexican GP | 29.10.22

“Firstly hola! Yeah unfortunately the first one [lap], which I think was quick enough for a second, maybe, I don’t know, it wasn’t quite good enough. The Red Bulls naturally are so fast. But I think this is such an amazing showing, really proud of my team.

This is the best qualifying we’ve had all year. Just shows that perseverance and never giving up is the way forward so, big thanks to everybody here and back at the factory.”

[Coulthard with a dumb question]

“Generally my laps have been pretty good so, I think the last lap wasn’t good enough but still, more performance in it. Yea, just keep pushing I’m pretty happy with that position [P3] to start to be honest, it’s a long way down to Turn 1.”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P8 in Brasil | 11.11.22

“I just went out to see what the conditions were like but obviously it was properly wet. It's motor racing.”

“It was difficult to see the conditions and it was difficult to see the rain drops, it was so dark. I was the last car out. I just got the earliest part of the rain. Probably lost too much temperature in the pitlane as well. Just a bit unfortunate. George did a great jobs well, and congratulations to Kevin.”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P5 in Abu Dhabi | 19.11.22

“We’ve had brake problems a lot, for most of the year. Front separation so, if one is at 200 degrees the other one is as 7 or 800 degrees, so if when you hit the brakes the car pulls one way. I was trying to get the other one to come up but it was never equalling the other brake. Normally they’d be both exactly the same [temperature].”

Pace for tomorrow?

“I imagine similar to today. We’re bouncing again… I don’t know if we’ll be heading for a podium but, I mean, if our degradation is better, then maybe.”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P4 during the Canadian GP | 18.06.22

“I feel amazing. So happy. P4... P4 has never felt so good to be honest. Maybe when I was like in my first year of racing in 2007 when I got my first P4 in quali. This kinda feels like that.”

“Particularly because it has been a difficult year and so to go through what we were faced with today. It was difficult for everyone out there. Really so happy. Everyone is working so hard, and we are constantly faced with these challenges with these car.”

“We did a lot of work overnight and the car did feel... We went two different directions yesterday to try and get the information. George's way, happened to be a lot better. So, the car didn't feel great through the session, so I think tomorrow we should be in a much better position. We have slightly different set-ups still for the race, but we’re in a great position. So hopefully I can hold position at least.”

Lewis on the booing for Max | 02.07.222

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P5 [without his penalty] at the Italian GP | 10.09.22

“It was an okay session, it wasn’t my best session. I think in Zandvoort it was pretty good. I think today, naturally we’re off the pace, but 5th was the best that I could do. I’m losing like 2 tenths in the last sector so, ultimately as a competitor I need to figure out those couple of corners but, nonetheless I’m generally happy with it. I didn’t mess up too much, I had one mistake I think in Q2 but rectified that.”

“I think we were expecting [this gap] because we saw this in Spa. With the lowest of wing downforce level, that’s where we seem to be particularly worse than the others, when we go to a circuit like Budapest which is maximum downforce.”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P6 in Barcelona | 21.05.21

“The team have done such a great job. Big big big thank you to everyone for continuing to push back at the factory. We don’t have bouncing in the straight line; which is a huge improvement for us. And the car is generally being nicer this weekend. (…) I’m a little big gutted because I didn’t… I wanna be further up ahead and you’ve obviously seen George is able to put it further ahead then I. But yeah I’ll keep pushing.”

“Just struggled with the balance of the car. And not where I want to be," Lewis said.

"It's something in the set-up. It was looking good in FP3 and we tried to progress in a similar direction. Maybe we went too far and then the car was undriveable. It's so nervous."

F1's parc ferme rules mean that drivers cannot change their car setup between qualifying and the race without being forced to start from the pitlane.

"I've got the same car as I had in qualifying, so I don't anticipate moving that far forwards," he said. "But I'll give it everything."

“She’s [W13] quite spiteful. She’s like a viper. Or like a rattlesnake you know?”

Lewis Hamilton after qualifying P5 in Melbourne