{"id":348843,"date":"2023-11-23T20:06:57","date_gmt":"2023-11-23T21:06:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=348843"},"modified":"2023-11-24T00:02:13","modified_gmt":"2023-11-24T00:02:13","slug":"hamilton-hits-back-after-rivals-explosive-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=348843","title":{"rendered":"Hamilton hits back after rival's explosive claim"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton<\/a> has denied that he or his representatives approached Red Bull<\/a> about the possibility of driving for their Formula One<\/a> team.<\/p>\n

In a British newspaper interview this week, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said Hamilton's representatives had made an inquiry earlier this year about whether there would be any interest.<\/p>\n

Hamilton signed a two-year contract with Mercedes in late August, tying him to the team until 2025. He responded to the report by saying that neither he nor his team representatives had contacted Horner.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI\u2019ve not approached Christian. I haven\u2019t spoken to Christian for years and no one from my team has,\u201d Hamilton said at the Abu Dhabi GP.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve checked with everyone, no one from my team has reached out to him. However, he had reached out to me about meeting up at the end of the season."<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hamilton, who has won a record-equalling seven F1 titles, said he found a message from Horner on an old phone where Horner asked him to meet up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI switched it on and obviously hundreds of messages came through and I realised there was one from Christian, (asking) to get together and have a chat at the end of the season,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n

"It was quite late on I found the message, it was from earlier on in the year. It was months later. I just said, \u2018Congratulations on the amazing season and I hope we are able to compete with you soon', and he (Horner) replied repeating the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Red Bull crushed the competition this season and last, with Max Verstappen clinching his second and third F1 titles. Mercedes has not won a race this year and won only one last year \u2014 through George Russell.<\/p>\n

Verstappen has dominated this year's championship even more than in 2022 and, heading into the season-ending Abu Dhabi GP, the 26-year-old Dutchman is chasing a record-extending 19th win of the season.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Verstappen was asked if he would like to have Hamilton as his teammate.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat would it add? It\u2019s not happening. There is no point to make up stories if it\u2019s not happening," he said. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t mind, it doesn\u2019t matter, anyone (can be my teammate). I don\u2019t want to particularly put it on Lewis, there are so many great drivers as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hamilton has a record 103 race wins, but faces a second straight season without a victory unless he wins on Monday (AEDT).<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, I wish we weren\u2019t in the position we were in,\u201d Hamilton said. \u201dBut I guess it means we\u2019ve got to work harder this weekend and I am definitely excited for the battle."<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton has denied that he or his representatives approached Red Bull about the possibility of driving for their Formula One team. In […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":348845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348843"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=348843"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":348848,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348843\/revisions\/348848"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/348845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=348843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=348843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=348843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}