Lewis Hamilton has explained how "survival instincts" took over as he somehow won the British Grand Prix this afternoon, after a tyre puncture on the final lap.
Mercedes' Valtteri Bottas suffered a puncture while in second late on, while his teammate Hamilton also had a puncture but somehow held on in the final lap to take his seventh win in the race.
Bottas and McLaren's Carlos Sainz both dropped out of the points after their tyre deflations.
That last lap almost had me 😅 We still got this 🏆🏁 I can’t express how grateful I am to all the fans, and to my incredible team. To think this is the 7th home win is just insane. Thanks for the positive energy everyone, we did this together. #BritishGP #TeamLH #StillWeRise @F1 pic.twitter.com/PyAPZ6SZrI
— Lewis Hamilton (@LewisHamilton) August 2, 2020
Red Bull's Max Verstappen finished second - but would have won if he hadn't gone to the pits in an attempt to earn the fastest lap points.
The Ferrari of Charles Leclerc was third ahead of Renault's Daniel Ricciardo in fourth, and McLaren's Lando Norris in fifth.
After the race at Silverstone Hamilton told Sky Sports F1 that he couldn't believe how manic the final lap was.
"I was really chilled for some reason at the end. Bono [his race engineer, Peter Bonnington] was giving me the information and the gap - I think it was 30s at one stage and it was coming down quite quickly.
"In my mind, I'm thinking 'how far is it to the end of the lap?'
"The car seemed to turn ok through Maggots and Becketts, thankfully. I got to [turn] 15 and that's where it was a struggle and I could hear the gap coming down from 19 to 10.
"So I remember giving it full gas from [turn] 15 down to 16 but then the thing wasn't stopping!
It’s a magnificent 7️⃣th win for @LewisHamilton at Silverstone 👏👏👏
What an incredible finish!
Max Verstappen takes second with Charles Leclerc in third!#BritishGP 🇬🇧 #F1 pic.twitter.com/hFpfHHKn0I— Formula 1 (@F1) August 2, 2020
"I got to the corner, a lot of understeer, and I heard him go 'nine, eight, seven' and I was like 'get back on the power and try to get the thing to turn'.
"I've definitely never experienced anything like that on the last lap. My heart definitely probably nearly stopped. That's probably how cool I was because my heart nearly stopped!
"I don't why I managed to be cool during the period. But I had no choice.
"Survival instincts come over you and that's really what I was thinking - 'I've come all this way, I'm not going to pull over and back off completely and let everyone drive past'. How can I still get there with taking as much risks as possible without losing the car altogether?"
Download the brand new OffTheBall App in the Play Store & App Store right now! We've got you covered!
Subscribe to OffTheBall's YouTube channel for more videos, like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter for the latest sporting news and content.
