Formula1 Championship Lewis Hamilton has confessed that, at the onset of the season, he found it hard to deal with stress from a resurgent Valtteri Bottas.
The Finn took two pole positions and two wins in the first four races of 2019, leading his Mercedes team-mate at the championship following them.
Hamilton admits that, while he is accustomed to slow starts he was temporarily worried by the form of Bottas.
“Qualifying was good in Melbourne but I lost the race. I had the damage and I dropped back quite far,” Hamilton told.
“The first couple of races are normally not perfect for me. They’re still not bad, better than average, but then there are all the outside pressures of ‘Valtteri 2.0’ and I am thinking, ‘We are 2-2 at one stage, two wins ‘.
“I have to remain solid in my head, I can not allow the exterior [factors to change me]… but being human it is very difficult not to notice those things.”
The Briton then went to pull away from Bottas and cruise to his sixth World Championship, and he consented that consistency has been the key factor in his enhanced form.
“More consistency within the race was really important for me. So other regions in only health facets, a weekend at, weekend outside delivering,” he added.
“It is mad because we must August and I’m thinking,’Jeez, I’ve had eight wins,’ and as a team, we’ve had like 14 wins and you sort of forget these things because you are just always looking forwards and time is always ticking.
“However, it was not intentional not to wow. I’ve been looking for that wow lap. And I’ve had laps but they have not revealed in the arrangement, necessarily.
“I think some of the next places that split up the Ferraris, for me felt like comparatively quite wow laps but because I was not on pole by half a second it does not seem that means for you. However, for me internally it did.”