F1: Hamilton Upbeat Despite China Grid Penalty

Formula 1

F1: Hamilton Upbeat Despite China Grid Penalty

Lewis Hamilton will drop five places on the Chinese GP grid due to a gearbox issue...

Adam Cooper | http://www.speedtv.com | Posted April 12, 2012 Shanghai (CHN)

Lewis Hamilton has a pair of third-place finishes in 2012. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Lewis Hamilton is still optimistic about his prospects for the Chinese GP, despite picking up a five-place grid penalty.

The team discovered a problem with the gearbox he used in Australia and Malaysia, so a fresh one will have to be fitted for qualifying and the race.

“When you arrive at a weekend and you’ve done all your preparations and the whole team’s done its preparations, of course it’s not the nicest thing to hear that we’ve got a problem,” said Hamilton.

“But all you can do is take it on the chin. We’re still here, we’ve still got a great chance to win, we’ve still got a quick car, we’ll try and put ourselves in the best position possible to make the right strategy and make sure that we’re quick enough so that we can still fight for the lead.

“We’ve got some upgrades, the team have done a great job to bring those, and we can still fight for wins. I came from third last year to win the race. You look at the last race and Fernando (Alonso) came from way further back, so anything is possible.”

Hamilton said he was not disappointed at coming away from the first two races with a pair of third places.

“You’ve just got to keep moving forward,” the McLaren driver said. “I’m pretty happy with the fact that I’ve had two podiums so far, and definitely don’t take anything for granted. I’ve got a good car and we’re in a really good position, but we’re still fighting. I’ve been training very, very hard trying to get myself in the right frame of mind for this weekend, and whilst we’ve come here with a small issue, I still feel very positive about the weekend, and as I said, we still have a chance to race.

“I love racing. When I was a kid I always used to love coming from the back of the grid. I’ll be five places back from wherever I qualify; that means I’m going to have to have a good race with a few people to fight for position.”

Adam Cooper notched up his 27th season as a racing journalist in 2011. He has written about F1 for SPEED.com since 2005. Follow him on Twitter.