Lewis Hamilton, I’m told, is no student of F1 history. Few F1 drivers are. Sebastian Vettel was knowledgeable; he even owns an ex-Mansell Williams FW14B. Of the current drivers, George Russell and outgoing Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz are, my F1 friends say, the best of an uninterested bunch.
Put it this way, if you started enthusing to Lewis, effervescent Murray Walker-style, about Ferrari’s first F1 victory (1951 British GP, Silverstone) or about the final round of the 1964 world championship in Mexico – when John Surtees in a Ferrari pipped both Jim Clark and Graham Hill to the title in the most exciting finale in championship history – then I suspect he would smile blankly and listen to rapper Ty Dolla $ign on his headphones instead.
And that’s fine. Few elite athletes are connoisseurs of their chosen sports. I, on the other hand, can name every F1 champion (and their winning year) and have been able to do so since I was 12. I can tell you José Froilán González won at Silverstone in 1951 (Enzo Ferrari gave him a gold watch afterwards) and Surtees won the 1964 title in Mexico after team-mate Lorenzo Bandini took out Graham Hill’s BRM.
Despite his lack of interest in history and his reputation as an F1 rebel – activist, fashionista, vegan – Lewis next year joins the most historic of all F1 teams. He calls it a ‘childhood dream’.
And hooray to that. As F1 racing abandons its historic roots for soulless circuits in the Middle East, Middle America and Asia, it’s good to see Lewis acknowledging tradition.
He’s not the first former champ to be lured by the romance of red. Prost, Schumacher, Alonso and Vettel all made the same move, but only Schumacher succeeding in bagging more titles. Prost, Alonso and Vettel all won races for Ferrari but never a world championship. Long before all that, Fangio made the move (from Mercedes, like Lewis), winning the world title for Ferrari in 1956. Intriguingly, Schumacher and Fangio stand alongside Lewis as the three most successful GP drivers in history. Nigel Mansell was Ferrari’s last F1 driver to be selected personally by Enzo and won occasionally for the red team, including his first race for Ferrari (1989, Brazil). But it took a move back to Williams to win the title.
Lewis will be the 12th Briton to drive a Ferrari in F1. Two Brits have won world titles for Ferrari. Former motorcycle champion Surtees won in 1964 after that Mexican finale. Mike Hawthorn won in 1958, after losing both his team-mates in a tragic if triumphant year
