Hamilton 'huge respect' for 'super-talented' Albon

Lewis Hamilton has confirmed he apologised to Alex Albon following late-race contact between the two at the Formula 1 season opener.

Twice in three races, Albon has been in a strong position to score his maiden F1 podium, and on both occasions, contact with Hamilton has taken this opportunity away.

Also on both occasions, Hamilton has been deemed the guilty party, and has been hit with a time-penalty.

"I have a huge amount of respect for Alex," said Hamilton. "I think he is a super-talented young man, and I don't have any bad blood or bad feelings towards him whatsoever.

"In Brazil, you saw me come straight towards him. That was wholeheartedly my mistake, my problem, and I tried to face it with dignity.

"Today was a racing incident. He was on a much better tyre. I entered the corner committed to blocking, defending the position.

"I took the corner as normal. I had quite a lot of lock on to get around the corner, but the track drops away and a lot of people go through that corner with a lot of understeer through there.

"I didn't get back on the power, I continued to decrease my speed, but he jumped on the power given he had so much grip.

"He still had like a car's width to the left of him, and ultimately we touched.

"I think it's unfortunate we collided, and I wouldn't want to ever collide with anybody, and I do think it was unfortunate, but I have to respect the decision the stewards ended up taking."

As Albon restrained himself in the post-race television interviews, the Thai-British driver wishing to calm down before commenting properly on the incident, Hamilton made a public apology to the Red Bull driver - even if, upon later viewing, the Mercedes man still viewed it as a racing incident.

He added: "Before I'd seen the incident I apologised to Alex in an interview, just because in the heat of the moment you don't always have the viewpoints of everything, and I didn't want to jump to conclusions.

"I then went to watch the replay and I think it was a racing incident."

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