Hamilton remains upbeat

3:12pm Sunday 12th October 2008

Lewis Hamilton extracted the positives from a dramatic Japanese Grand Prix on Sunday before setting his sights on victories in the remaining two races to secure the world championship.

The McLaren driver was on pole but made a bad start as he forced Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen off the circuit at turn one when attempting to pass the Finn. That manoeuvre meant he dropped down the field and was also hit with a drive-through penalty. And it got worse for the Briton in the next lap when he spun after a collision with title rival Felipe Massa and eventually finished 12th.

"Obviously I am disappointed," said Hamilton. "I am not happy after a result like today but I'm already getting over it and tomorrow will be another day."

He added: "Disappointingly, I didn't make a great start but I slipstreamed Kimi and went up the inside. I braked a bit late - but so did everybody.

"A lot of cars went wide at turn one and I just went a bit wider than everyone else.

"But you can't undo the penalty or change the result.

"On lap two, Felipe went wide and I went up the inside, giving him room, but he tapped me quite hard into a spin."

Ferrari's Massa closed the gap in the driver standings to five points having first finished eighth before profiting from a penalty handed to Sebastien Bourdais to be promoted to seventh.

The race was won by Renault's Fernando Alonso who followed up his triumph in Singapore to claim back-to-back wins for the first time since 2006.

Robert Kubica claimed second place in his BMW Sauber while Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen finished third.

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