Lewis Hamilton issues statement after 'painful lesson' with Ferrari

Lewis Hamilton says he and Ferrari experienced a "painful lesson" after his strategy gamble backfired in the Singapore Grand Prix.

From third on the Marina Bay grid, Hamilton finished sixth after a failed one-stop strategy in which he found himself losing chunks of time at the end of the race.

Starting on the mediums, the soft tyres quickly emerged as the favoured race tyre, with Hamilton abandoning his medium strategy from third place on Lap 18, and switched to used soft tyres, and was on what Ferrari called Plan C strategy - a two-stop.

However, under the virtual safety car for Lance Stroll's stopped Aston Martin, Hamilton missed the pit-entry, and eventually decided to try and tough it out on a one-stop, with his tyres required to last 44 laps.

In the closing stages, Kimi Antonelli and Lando Norris both got past the slow Ferrari, with Oscar Piastri reeling Hamilton in for fifth place on the penultimate lap, as Hamilton issued an apology to the team on the cooldown lap. 

Hamilton then felt unwell and was given FIA permission to miss the traditional post-race written media pen after a medical check, but Ferrari then issued a statement from the seven-time champion.

"Today wasn’t the result we were looking for and it was on me," Hamilton said in the statement. 

"At a track that’s difficult to overtake, you need to try something different and I chose to start on a new medium tyre, to go long and try to make a one-stop work.

"Unfortunately, the medium didn’t perform as well as the soft.

"I had a good second stint, and the pace was back, but I couldn’t make the progress I needed. 

"Under the VSC, the team called me in, but I missed the entry. After that, I decided to stay out and try to hold track position to the end, but in the closing laps, I was struggling massively with tyre degradation and lost three places, finishing P6, which doesn't reflect the pace we had in the car today.

"[It was] a painful lesson today, but I take full responsibility for the decisions I made. Not every call will work out, and I can accept getting it wrong, but I’m sorry for the team for the points we lost.

"They put so much into every weekend, and I wanted to deliver more for them. I’ll continue to put the work in and come back fighting at the next race."