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Lewis' Law: Just don't call it a comeback

Hamilton could take home the F1 Championship if results go his way in Abu Dhabi (AFP PHOTO / BEN STANSALL)
Roar Guru
5th October, 2016
5

“Something doesn’t feel right. I just can’t believe that there’s eight Mercedes and only mine are the ones that have gone this way.”

“Something just doesn’t feel right. It was a brand new engine. It’s just odd. There’s been like 43 engines for Mercedes (this season) and only mine have gone.”

The words of a miffed, upset, and troubled Lewis Hamilton following another engine failure, this time in Malaysia.

Having turned a 43-point deficit to Nico Rosberg into a 19-point championship lead in Germany, Hamilton’s words flowed freely realising he now has to do it all again – with Rosberg on the other side of the garage now enjoying a 23-point advantage with five races remaining.

Hamilton’s brand is sustained by melodrama, so it would be churlish to deny him the odd fatalistic Shakespearean soliloquy in the face of an unbroken PR-grade #blessed, #positivityONLY ascendancy.

Later, after the calming words of Toto Wolff had sunk-in, Hamilton redirected his accusation not at Mercedes but to “someone or something [that] doesn’t want me to win”. Much more PR-friendly, but no less Iago-like in its delivery.

Hamilton is no different from any driver with a healthy ego, but is equally enriched with the paranoia that comes with the cut-throat arena of Formula One. We mustn’t forget that Hamilton’s first season in 2007 was conspicuous for his inter-team battle with the then volatile Fernando Alonso and the Spygate scandal.

“There’s a lot of noise but there’s always been a lot of noise” explains Hamilton in an interview gracefully sent to me for editing by Chinese newspaper, Titan Sports.

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“Since I got here in 2007 there’s been so much BS in the air. Unfortunately, there’s a big cloud of that floating around in Formula One and there always will be, just like there is in all sports; tennis, NFL, Tour de France. All sports really. There’s always something going on but that’s just part and parcel of the business.”

In 2007, Hamilton learned a lot of lessons – the main being to get fresh, young, eager people working with him.

Motor sport is tough and after a period of time you lose your energy. The passion is still there but the travel is relentless. When Lewis started in F1 everything was new, so enthusiasm and energy levels were high. When he won in Canada, then travelled to New York and won again in Indianapolis it was just an awesome ride – and that flowed onto his performance.

Eleven years on, nobody is questioning Hamilton’s work ethic, but turning up to Shanghai for the tenth time must surely be taxing for even the most mentally fit individual.

But as Lewis himself attests: “There’s never going to be a perfect weekend. But that’s good, because if I think you reach the peak then what have you got to look forward to?”

So is there anything tipping Hamilton’s mood into the negative other than the usual ebb and flow of a tightly-fought championship season? Hamilton has hinted that the technical development direction of the Mercedes W07 appears to favour Rosberg and thus doesn’t allow him to brake later and harder than his teammate – taking away a unique piece of weaponry in the Briton’s armoury.

But in Hungary, Hamilton achieved a win that – based on practice and qualifying performances that weekend – looked out of the equation, only to have speed to burn on Sunday.

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Hamilton was philosophical about his performance, saying: “There never really is a perfect victory. Every victory is new and genuinely feels different in itself, because it’s been achieved in a different way. [Hungary] was not a really good weekend or wasn’t looking like the good weekend that it turned out to be.”

Hamilton and Rosberg engaged in quite a passive-aggressive exchange that weekend during the post-qualifying press conference; debating whether the German lifted off enough on his qualifying pole lap under yellow flags. The matter didn’t end there, with the Briton taking the matter further with race stewards.

Come Sunday, Lewis would be leading the championship and again evoked the words of befallen rapper Tupac Shakur: ‘still I rise’.

Shakur’s full quote actually reads: “Act up if you feel me, I was born not to make it but I did, the tribulations of a ghetto kid, still I rise.”

It’s a position Hamilton often slips into when it suits. Just as Nigel Mansell sought to amplify any obstacle he had overcome on route to victory, Hamilton appears to cocoon his psyche by taking on the persona of the downtrodden underdog – albeit one with a healthy entourage of celebrity buddies and bling to match.

If Nico Rosberg wins the championship it would make a good father and son story on the back of his father, Keke’s win in 1982. However, if Lewis won, the story would undoubtedly be about fighting back to win the championship.

Fellow Briton, John Surtees perhaps pulled off the greatest comeback in 1964 to overturn his 20-point (55 in modern terms) deficit to Jim Clark in five races, while Kimi Raikkonen’s triumph in 2007 from the equivalent of 45 points down and Sebastian Vettel’s title in 2012 from 44 points behind is perhaps more befitting among his contemporaries.

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Hamilton was slightly standoffish when asked whether his, or Rosberg’s would make the better story of 2016.

“I think that’s an extremely biased question so that’s not for me to say”, he said.

“Naturally my story, for me personally, is a different story. There’s a lot of depth in the story of where we came from as a family. That’s all I can say. I don’t know their [the Rosberg’s] story and if they wrote it that way, that’s probably how I would perceive it.

Having raced against one other for more almost twenty years in karts and junior formula, has Hamilton been surprised by the way Nico has improved in Formula One?

“No I haven’t been surprised by that…” offers Lewis. “There’s been surprises along the way but it hasn’t been that.”

Again, Lewis leaves his comments open to interpretation, but with enough pause for the melodrama to have the desired effect.

If Nico does indeed go on to take the championship, it should be remembered not for the reliability he enjoyed over Hamilton (remember Even Keke sealed a championship with but a solitary victory), but for the personal development he has gained as a driver over a team mate that is widely regarded as one of the best of his generation. Surely even Lewis can take some solace in that.

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In a recent advertising campaign, released in collaboration with Allianz, a heavily made up 80-year-old Hamilton purports to teach his imagined grandchildren some hard-earned life lessons in 2066, but what lessons does Hamilton hope to take away once he leaves Formula One?

“I hope that I’ve achieved all that I wanted to achieve and I’m able to leave with peace in my heart and I’m able to go on and have other things to focus on” says Lewis.

The next five races will be quite revealing.

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