Malaysian GP: Lewis Hamilton denies Nico Rosberg blocked him

On his second run, Hamilton set a fastest first sector but then appeared to be held up by Rosberg on the approach to Turn 7, which is two thirds of the way through sector two. The Briton subsequently backed off.

His lap on his first run was still good enough to take pole, with Rosberg third behind Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel.

When asked directly if he was blocked by Rosberg, Hamilton said: "No. I decided to take the second lap.

"My first sector was quickest and then I bailed out.

"I had traffic, I had people in front of me. There were quite a few cars ahead.

"It was looking quite good, the sector looked quite good.

"I saw the cars and knew they would get in the way so I decided to take the second lap."

When Rosberg was asked if he held up Hamilton, he said: "You'd best ask Lewis about that...

"No, it's not even a relevant discussion because we were both on slow-down laps at that point in time and that was very, very clear."

The German was then told that Hamilton said he bailed out to which he replied: "Yeah but if you bail out of a lap it turns into a slow-down lap.

"I'm sure he bailed out well before coming up on me. How do we make that a fact that he bailed out before he came across me?

"I don't have an answer to make that a fact for you but I will have to think about something later on."