At least you still have a following Lewis

After trailing home in 16th place at Silverstone, Lewis Hamilton said the support he received from the home crowd was the most enjoyable aspect of his British Grand Prix.

The world champion qualified a career-worst 19th on Saturday and starting one place higher after Force India's Adrian Sutil in turn started from the pitlane, he rose four places on the opening lap.

However, after running on to the grass at the start of the Hangar Straight on lap two in avoidance of Fernando Alonso, he then lost a place to BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica.

That was as good as it got for Hamilton, who was visibly struggling with the handling of his McLaren Mercedes car through the high-speed corners which characterise the Northamptonshire circuit.

Returning to the track on which a stunning victory in the wet gave his championship challenge an important boost last year, Hamilton had an incident-filled race.

His duel with double world champion Fernando Alonso - for 16th place - kept the crowd entertained, with Hamilton passing the Spaniard into Copse corner on lap 30.

However, he lost ground to Alonso's Renault just one lap later after his car broke traction in the Becketts complex.

He had already survived a near collision with BMW Sauber's Nick Heidfeld in the same sequence of corners and later spun at Vale.

"I gave it my all today," Hamilton said. "Despite fighting for the lower positions, I was absolutely on the limit for the whole race.

"We knew it would be difficult, and I enjoyed my battle with Fernando, but we didn't have the pace today to get into the points.

"The best thing about this weekend has been the fans: they really gave me some consolation by cheering me on throughout the race.

"I would love to have given them a result to make them happy and my country proud, but we still have a lot of work ahead of us before that will be realistic."