McLaren’s Hamilton blames pit crew botches for wrecking F1 championship chances

London: McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton, who will be joining Mercedes next season, has blamed early season pit-stop botches for wrecking his Formula One championship hopes ahead of Sunday’s Indian Grand Prix.

Asked if a string of early pit-stop mistakes were at the root of their troubled season, he replied: “It’s one of the main reasons we are not fighting for the world championship now. Unfortunately, with several issues we had as a team, we lost quite a lot of the ­opportunity we had.” “We had quite a good car at the beginning of the year and we weren’t able to capitalise on it,” the Daily Mirror quoted Hamilton, as saying. McLaren won the opening race and Hamilton went on to lead the championship with three consecutive podium finishes, but the toll of mistakes quickly tipped him off the top. ANI