Equalling Michael Schumacher’s seven titles will underline that the British driver is perhaps his sport’s last great champion – but his world is a bigger place than the paddock
Colour has always mattered in Formula One. Bugattis were blue, Ferraris are red, Mercedes are silver – that kind of thing. But in 2020 Lewis Hamilton brought a different awareness of what colour can mean to a sport whose emphasis on technological progress has always been accompanied by a deep cultural conservatism.
In a year when he was aiming to make history by surpassing Michael Schumacher’s all-time record of 91 grand prix wins and matching the same driver’s total of seven world championships, Hamilton could have been forgiven for keeping his head down and concentrating wholly on his work in the cockpit. And indeed this season has shown us all the dimensions of his greatness – overcoming a disintegrating tyre to win at Silverstone, untouchably imperious at Spa, using all his racecraft to prevail at Portimão – as well as exhibiting the occasional flaw that makes him human.
Written by Richard Williams
This news first appeared on https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/nov/14/lewis-hamilton-the-man-from-stevenage-who-became-the-moral-compass-of-f1 under the title “Lewis Hamilton: the man from Stevenage who became the moral compass of F1”. Bolchha Nepal is not responsible or affiliated towards the opinion expressed in this news article.
