THREE-WHEELING TO GLORY!
Lewis survives last-lap blowout to secure win
OF all the palpitations Lewis Hamilton has subjected fans to on his rollercoaster blaze through Formula One, his threewheel victory at Silverstone yesterday must rank high among them.
Hearts leapt into mouths as coming around Woodcote into the old pit straight, the great champion’s front-left tyre betrayed him during a last lap as dramatic as most of the foregoing British Grand Prix had been torpid.
Sparks flew under his Mercedes that was suddenly slung low so it grated along the asphalt.
The question was whether Hamilton could pilot his crippled car to the chequered flag without Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, reshod on fresh rubber and closing fast, passing him and stealing glory.
Half the 3.7-mile lap was left to run. Copse, Maggotts, Becketts, Chapel — corners of speed and legend — were still to be navigated. Then the Hangar Straight, Stowe, Vale and Club, before the final short, but this time agonisingly painful, trip to the startfinish line and sanctuary.
The butchered tyre hung off its wheel, Hamilton’s physio Angela Cullen peered nervously through her fingers back in the garage, but Hamilton steered himself to safety. Just. His last lap was 28sec slower than Verstappen’s desperate dart. The margin of victory was 5.8sec, down from half-a-minute before the excitement unfolded.
Hamilton was lucky because if Verstappen had not been called in for new tyres in order to shoot for the point that comes with the fastest-lap time, which he secured, the Dutchman would only have needed to get around in one piece to snatch a victory that had previously looked unlikely all afternoon.
‘I’ve definitely never experienced anything like that on the last lap,’ said Hamilton. ‘My heart nearly stopped.
‘I was just praying to get around and not be too slow. I nearly didn’t get through the last few corners.’
Having collected his thoughts, Hamilton considered the chance of mortal danger he had faced, saying: ‘In the heat of the moment the adrenaline is going. It’s the instinct for survival which comes out and I was able to stay calm and measured to bring the thing home.
‘Now, I am just thinking of all the things that could have happened if the tyre had given up in a high-speed corner. It would have been a much different picture, so I feel incredibly grateful that it didn’t.
‘I was thinking how am I going to get through these last corners without losing too much time? But once I got to the last two corners that was really when it was a disaster. I just managed to keep it together.’
The warning signs have been there in the preceding few minutes. Carlos Sainz’s McLaren suffered a front-left puncture. Then Hamilton’s team-mate Valtteri Bottas the same. That plunged the Finn down from a seemingly certain second place to 11th.
Charles Leclerc, way off Verstappen’s Red Bull throughout, took third place for Ferrari in that late turnaround.
Hamilton lifted the trophy high to no more than the enthusiastic applause of his team. But he can take satisfactions regardless: he is a yawning 30 points ahead of nearest pursuer Bottas after three successive victories; and he stands on 87 career wins, four off Michael Schumacher’s 91.
It had all looked so routine yesterday. Hamilton, starting on pole, held off Bottas, who made the better start, around the outside of the first corner, Abbey. He was then kept honest by Bottas, who, for long chunks, was only a second and a bit behind.
There were two safety car phases. The first when Red Bull’s Alex Albon and Haas’s Kevin Magnussen collided at Luffield. Magnussen’s race ended there and then. The stewards blamed Albon for the smash, handing him a 5sec penalty.
The safety car came out again when AlphaTauri’s Daniil Kvyat banged into a concrete wall after losing control at 190mph at the flat-out Maggotts. He walked away unharmed, but then pushed the cameraman who was filming him walk away.
Nico Hulkenberg did not get into the race. Called up from nowhere to take the place of Covid victim Sergio Perez, his Racing Point car remained laid up in the garage. It was a footnote on the day.