Nicolas Hamilton: Lewis has ‘massive pressure on him’

Media playback is not supported on this device ‘He wants to win everything’

We caught up with Hamilton in the Renault garage during the Singapore Grand Prix

Brazilian-born Nicolas Hamilton on brother Lewis’s impact on the sport

“F1 is a sport in danger of not making the right decisions, whether it’s driver selection, which makes sense at one time might not make sense now.”

In hindsight, I think my decision made sense in the sense that I felt it was the right time to step away at that point in my career. I didn’t feel any insecurity or worry about Lewis.

It was just a matter of leaving the sport where you’ve done so much, and not doing too much at the same time.

You have to look at the package as a whole, not just the individual things that happen to you every day in an F1 car.

The power units are easily the most dramatic thing to happen in the sport.

‘Lewis is always super motivated, like me’

“Lewis is always super motivated, like me. He’s driven 100% every race he’s had since his arrival.”

All these changes that are happening on track, with driver selection and the power units and how they work.

Are they being done for the sport? Or are they being done for egos?

I didn’t feel that way when I was leaving the sport. I felt I’d built a business, a team and had a very good thing going.

Lewis wanted me to stay. I had another deal in place with another company in the sport where I was going to be actually with Nico at Mercedes and Mercedes were my team.

Lewis was like: ‘Look at my position with Mercedes,’ but he still wanted me to stay with Williams. He thought it would be very wrong for me to leave and want to be the number one, when he was the number one and then I turned up and they wanted to take my number one – he felt like there was some kind of conspiracy.

Lewis Hamilton ‘wasn’t happy’ at Williams until they offered him a non-driving role

Lewis’s decision to move his number from number 11 to seven was a bit weird for me.

I was really happy because I’d won most of my race victories as number 11. But Lewis’s motivation was: ‘I’ll be driving this year’.

He wasn’t happy, and so Williams offered me a non-driving role because they thought I could bring more to the team than a driver.

He wanted to give me his time in the car but he felt I was making it difficult for him to perform.

He needed to have someone to listen to him and understand him.

‘All that money is not enough to win’

“In London, I’m living pretty fabulously. Lewis is not really comfortable in London so it will be difficult to get him out here as long as he is where he wants to be. He goes back to London to be with his family.

I told him it’s not good for me to move him because he’s less comfortable and therefore I have to go to the heart of him and his pressure. It’s good for me, but he’s not really the driving force.

Nicolas Hamilton (left) with brother Lewis (right) and father Anthony in 2011

I definitely feel like he’s trying to challenge himself. He wants to win everything and he’s trying to find the right side of himself to say ‘OK, I can do this’.”

His mum and dad are from Jamaica, so I don’t think he’s the ideal son. He wants to show all his grandad, uncles and cousins the right side of life.

All the money isn’t enough to win.

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