Lewis Hamilton never had any doubts he would sign a contract extension at Mercedes and insists he sees his Formula One career extending beyond its expiry date of 2018.
Hamilton and Mercedes finally confirmed a three-year deal on Wednesday ahead of the Monaco Grand Prix, one rumoured to be in the region of £100 million. Negotiations begun during the winter and have dragged through the opening races, though both parties continued to stress it was only the finer points of the contract causing delays.
"There was never any doubt, honestly," Hamilton said when asked about the length of time it took to confirm the deal. "I always felt, or I was led to believe, that the team was committed to and naturally, with all the success that we have had, the relationship we have, it felt certain. So that's why I kinda took my time. I didn't feel that I was being challenged anywhere by another driver so it was a good thing."
When asked if he thinks he has another contract left in him after this one expires, he laughed and replied: "[33] is still pretty young hopefully, so I definitely see me continuing past that."
Hamilton went on to explain why the extension took so long to iron out and joked he had made a commission in the absence of former management company XIX Entertainment, who he split with towards the end of his title-winning 2014 campaign.
"What took long? Well, we started conversations in February. I took my time; some weeks I thought about it, some weeks I didn't. I didn't feel there was a particular rush, I had this year still contracted so it wasn't the case that it was every single day I was studying it. I would go away from it, come back to it, go away from it, come back to it, go away from it, come back to it - just took my time really. It was also the first time I had ever done it [myself]. There was a lot to learn, a lot of studying to do to understand everything. It was great. I earnt my 10% so I feel great!"
The Strategy Group recently outlined regulation changes it has put forward for the coming seasons and Hamilton had these in mind when he signed on the dotted line.
"It would have been very silly if I hadn't taken [rule changes] into account. Generally, what you have to do whenever you think about the future, is think about the long run and naturally, as I said, when I joined this team [in 2013], I knew the plans and changes it was making to get where we are now. And, of course, I have analysed where the team plans to go moving forward, so it was a quite easy decision."