London: Lewis Hamilton pointed to problems in his personal life as a contributing factor to his failure to recapture the Formula One title and said he is trying to banish "outside intrusions" from his mind in 2011.
Reflecting on a tough season that he rated as a six out of 10, the 2008 world champion gave a rare insight into issues troubling him away from the track and said in a radio interview he hopes to "smooth everything off."
Hamilton did not specify what was bothering him, but the McLaren driver's season began in March amid the fallout from the high-profile decision to drop his father, Anthony Hamilton, as manager.
Hamilton won just three out of 19 races as he finished fourth in the 2010 drivers' championship.
"The personal life, the way things have gone have not been as smooth and as happy as they could have been in the past and to do what I do is a combination of many, many things that are surrounding you," Hamilton told BBC Radio One. "It's not just arriving at the race track and driving, it's your appearances, it's your mood swings, it's the people that are around you — your family and your friends — and the time that you are able to give to them and the relationship that you have with them.
"As soon as some of those things are off — and you've not got all those pieces of the puzzle in place — then it makes it very hard to do other aspects of your life as easily. The key I think to life is getting all those pieces of the puzzle in place."
Hamilton's relationship with Pussycat Dolls singer Nicole Scherzinger does not appear to be one of his problems, with the Briton indicating that the romance — often described as on-off in the British media — is on track, referring to her as "my girl."
Hamilton said he wants to ensure he is more relaxed in 2011, explaining that then "you are able to focus on your job — even better perhaps than you have in the past."
"My plan right now is to ... smooth everything off and make sure that next year I am 100 percent clear in my mind and have no outside intrusions mentally," he said in between picking his top music tracks of 2010.
The 25-year-old Hamilton is drawing inspiration from Tiger Woods, who finished the year without a victory for the first time as a pro after a year of turmoil following revelations of marital infidelities and a high-profile divorce.
"I look at the likes of Tiger Woods — I see him as the best golfer, he's a complete legend," Hamilton said. "He's had many, many things that have had an impact on him this year, but he still plays, he still pars it, he still gets birdies. But that to him is a bad year, but to other people — I play golf and I'd love to get a par — when everything is right he is amazing."
Although Hamilton remained in the hunt for the F1 title until the last race of the season in Abu Dhabi last month, he finished 16 points behind Red Bull winner Sebastian Vettel in the drivers' championship.
"It's been a long time since I finished out of the top three of a championship in my career," Hamilton said. "Finishing fourth is not something that I'm not particularly proud of.
"We had a solid couple of bad races where I lost points which would have put me in a much stronger position to compete for the championship at the end of the year and really just throughout the year in general."
The new season begins on March 13 in Bahrain.
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