Lewis Hamilton has rejected theories of internal conflict within his McLaren team, suggesting that it is an invention of the press.
A reporter in Montreal on Sunday asked the debutant winner if he even cared that his Spanish teammate Fernando Alonso had endured a difficult race.
“Of course. That’s a bit of a silly question,” he started, reporting a “lot of respect” for the reigning world champion and denying that they share a thorny relationship.
The real war, it seems, was being played out by the press; Spain’s Diario As exclaiming in a headline on Tuesday that their British counterparts “enthrone Hamilton and despise Alonso”.
Another newspaper, ‘El Mundo’, described the situation at McLaren as “apparent calm, obvious tension”.
But Alonso is also showing signs of antagonism, telling the radio transmitter Cadena Ser this week that he does not feel “totally comfortable” with Hamilton as his teammate.
“I am with a British teammate in a British team — and everyone knows that all of their support and their help is for him,” he said.
“But I have always understood this and I do not complain about it.”
Alonso agreed that the British press, preoccupied with the local hero Hamilton, is seemingly “indifferent” to him.
But “thank God the Spanish press has more respect,” he added.
