Hamilton admits contract saga ’a pain’

Lewis Hamilton’s increasingly farcical contract saga looks set to continue.

The reigning world champion has been saying for weeks that talks with Mercedes about extending the deal beyond 2015 are finally coming to an end.

Reports have suggested a new contract, estimated to be worth up to a staggering $50 million a year to the 30-year-old Briton, is basically agreed.

But asked if an announcement is due in China this weekend, Hamilton told Britain’s Sky: "I think it’s unlikely."

The two-time title winner does not currently have someone playing the traditional role of a driver manager, so he says he has been reading the fine print of the proposed contract himself.

"Obviously at the last race I said it would be done within a week," said Hamilton.

"This is my first time negotiating myself and you don’t know how many times I’ve had to read about 80 pages — it is so much reading and it is all in lawyer jargon. So it has been a quite a pain in the backside to be honest," he admitted.