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'A humbling experience': Lewis Hamilton seals sixth Formula 1 world title – video

Lewis Hamilton already an all-time great and maybe the last of a long line

This article is more than 4 years old
Rookie from Stevenage has won a grand prix in every one of his 13 seasons and matured into an F1 champion of substance

Lewis Hamilton is no longer the bright-eyed, fresh-faced prodigy who burst into Formula One at the age of 22. Approaching the middle of his fourth decade, he is a more guarded, reflective man who makes sure every scrap of experience built up over almost 250 grands prix is exploited as, having seen off his contemporaries, he holds a new generation of wonderkids at bay.

At the moment Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Alex Albon and Lando Norris can only stand back and admire the achievements of a driver, once a prodigy like them, who has propelled himself to a position alongside the most revered figures in his sport’s long history.

Of all the statistics rolled out on Sunday as he celebrated his sixth world championship the one that resonates most powerfully is his record of having won a grand prix in every one of his 13 seasons in F1. No other all-time great – not Fangio, not Senna, not Schumacher – managed that.

By the time the new season starts Hamilton will have turned 35. At that age most F1 drivers of the modern era have taken their trophies into retirement or dropped down the grid or drifted away to race at Le Mans or Indianapolis. Hamilton’s hunger for success and validation seems as fierce as it was when he turned up for his first grand prix and quickly proved more than a match for his new teammate, Fernando Alonso, a double world champion at the peak of his powers.

The rookie from Stevenage showed himself to be a driver who raced with great passion but had prepared for the task with full attention to the science of driving and the technology of the sport. He is an emotional man and the fluctuations of his personal life have occasionally affected his performances but his devotion to the task of winning races appears, if anything, to have deepened as the years have gone by. In the aftermath of the US Grand Prix, where he secured his sixth title, his team’s technical director, James Allison, told the BBC how diligently Hamilton works with his engineers and how astutely he now judges his effort. So if the outward brilliance of his driving has dimmed a little, the substance has increased.

Lewis Hamilton on his way to clinching the title in Austin. Photograph: Pixathlon/REX/Shutterstock

In his early days he gave the occasional bravura performance to rank alongside Fangio at the Nürburgring in 1957, Senna at Donington Park in 1993 and Schumacher at Budapest in 1998. His win at a wet Silverstone in 2008, constantly wiping his visor, was unforgettable. But he is now more likely to win a race through something like the canny stalking that forced Sebastian Vettel into a mistake in Montreal during June, or the phenomenal ability to make a set of old, hard tyres last until the chequered flag, as he did in Mexico City last month while also coping with damage to his car caused in a hectic opening lap. In Austin on Sunday, a week after the Mexico win, he used similar racecraft to turn fifth place on the grid into the second place that gave him the title.

Only one significant statistic lies beyond his reach. Juan Manuel Fangio started 51 races, of which he won 24. Hamilton’s annual schedule features far more races than the great Argentinian had to face – more than 20, to the six or seven of the 1950s – with a much higher general level of competition. Which is not to say Hamilton is a greater driver than the man who provided the sport with its yardstick for almost half a century, simply that he faces a stronger and more consistent challenge from his rivals.

In terms of race wins over those 13 seasons he has outscored his various teammates – Alonso, Heikki Kovalainen, Jenson Button, Nico Rosberg and Valtteri Bottas – by 83 to 42. Only in 2013, when Rosberg took two victories to Hamilton’s one, has a teammate outscored him over a season. But that was the Englishman’s first year after moving to Mercedes, where the German had been ensconced for the preceding three seasons. And even in 2016, when Rosberg became the only teammate to beat Hamilton to a world championship, Lewis outscored him 10-9 in race wins.

He is right to feel that the outright dislike he provokes among some Formula One fans and other members of the public is rooted in a form of racism. Why else would the first mixed-race champion be sneered at for his jewellery, his braids and tattoos, his liking for hip-hop and catwalk fashion? Why else would he be criticised for leaving the country to avoid tax when earlier British heroes such as Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, Damon Hill and Button did the same without incurring an ounce of disapproval? And when he talks about wanting to make his life carbon-neutral, he is accused of hypocrisy by people who take their kids a mile to school in an SUV, drive diesel trucks for a living or jet off for winter holidays in the Caribbean.

Other factors may have affected his general popularity. Formula One is no longer broadcast live on free-to-air TV, while the complexity of the modern regulations makes the races hard for all but aficionados to follow. More profoundly, the climate emergency raises big questions about the future of motor sport as the gaudy symbol of a world running on fossil fuel. Over the next two or three years Hamilton may draw level with and even surpass Michael Schumacher’s record of seven world titles and he would certainly deserve it. But he could also be the last of his kind.

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