AUSTIN (AFP) - Lewis Hamilton said "it would suck big time" if he failed to win this year's world championship in Abu Dhabi because of F1's controversial decision to award double points at the final race.

Looking calm and confident throughout a routine drivers' news conference at the Circuit of the Americas ahead of this weekend's United States Grand Prix, Hamilton said he was not wasting energy thinking about it.

Hamilton holds a 17-point lead ahead of his Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg in the title race with three races remaining and knows he could lose everything if he suffers ill luck, or an enforced retirement, in Abu Dhabi.

Asked if he felt this was fair - if Rosberg won to take the title after Hamilton retired at the final race - the 29-year-old Englishman said: "I think the question is 'what is fair'?

"This is the rule that they have brought in for the first time. Do I agree with it? I don't know if any of us agree with it, or do not agree with it, but it is the way it is and you just have to deal with it and hope for the best really.

"I am not even going to put that negative energy out there, I'm just going to try to do the best job I can with the car that I have and what will be will be, I guess.

"But it would suck, if that was the case, big time."