Belgian Grand Prix: Rested world champion Hamilton looks to avoid repeat of last year’s mishap

Formula One gears up for latter part of the season after four-week break.

FRANCORCHAMPS: Four weeks on from a poignant and incident-packed Hungarian Grand Prix, the Formula One circus is back this weekend with defending champion Lewis Hamilton aiming to increase his lead in this year’s title race at the classic Belgian Grand Prix.

The 30-year-old Briton, who has a 21-point advantage over Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg in the drivers’ championship after 10 of this year’s 19 races, wants not only to stay on top, but to erase all memories of last year’s events with a confidence-boosting win.

After the sadness of losing Frenchman Jules Bianchi, who died shortly before last month’s Hungarian race won by resurgent German Sebastian Vettel for Ferrari, Hamilton and the rest have taken a break and returned recharged for the action that lies ahead.

Last year, Hamilton and Rosberg collided in a controversial and spectacular incident that overshadowed the race and led to disciplinary action by the team, a sequence of events that team chief Austrian Toto Wolff is keen not to see repeated.

Hamilton finished sixth in Hungary in July after a scruffy race littered with mistakes and has been in Barbados and New York during his holidays. “It’s been good to relax, train and recharge the batteries,” he said. “There’s always that flame in the back of your mind that just wants to get back out there and get on with it — especially after a race like Hungary. For me, Spa is a great track to kick off the second part of the season.”

Rosberg, who finished eighth after a late collision, said, “Hungary was such a big disappointment and I’ve been itching to get back to racing ever since. When you’re in such a close battle for the championship, any opportunity to gain points is crucial and it’s up to me to take those chances — but also to make them for myself.”

Mercedes have won eight of the 10 races to date, but have some concerns about the introduction of rule-changes that reduce the ‘driver aids’ in use at the start of the race and hand greater responsibility to the man in the cockpit.

Given that Mercedes were beaten comprehensively at the start at the last two races, it is chief Toto Wolff who will have most to worry about this time.

He may need to take special note of the form of Finn Kimi Raikkonen who is not only a Spa specialist, but also a driver boosted by being told that he will stay with Ferrari next year.

“What can I say?” said Raikkonen. “For me, to be able to stay another year means that the dream goes on. The Scuderia is my family, as I always said, it’s here I want to end my career.”

Published in The Express Tribune, August 21^st, 2015.

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