> Did Hamilton press the wrong button?

A usually reliable source tells Pitpass that it was not a transmission glitch which caused Lewis Hamilton to slow on Lap 8 of yesterday's Brazilian Grand Prix, thereby virtually ending his championship hopes, but a mistake by the driver himself.

Our source claims that Hamilton caused his gearbox to fail by touching the wrong button (the Start button). As a result he had to reload the system/software. Earlier in the race, another mistake saw the Englishman go wide, losing several positions, as he attempted to make up for a poor start.

Previously, team boss Ron Dennis claimed that the gearbox fault was a team error: "There was an incorrect command given to the system", Dennis told reporters. "That fault, why did the system get an incorrect command, we don't know yet. It could be a sensor."

Originally Posted by bottle

hamilton admitted it

Hamilton, whose McLaren dropped through the field last Sunday when his gearbox slipped into neutral, reportedly told the French newspaper La Presse that he accidentally pressed a wrong button on his steering wheel.

The Briton's claim is backed by on-board camera footage that depicts Hamilton's left thumb as pressing a button before he slowed.

But Dennis is on Tuesday quoted as saying: "There was nothing that Lewis did that had any relevance to the gearbox."

Hamilton, who had to pause an interview with reporters in his Sao Paulo hotel room on Monday afternoon to throw up, called the incident a "small hiccup" that cost him a place in F1's record books.