HAMILTON ON BRINK OF CROWN AFTER TRIUMPH IN SINGAPORE
Soon only Schumacher will be ahead of red-hot Hamilton in F1 greatness
SOMETIME in the next few weeks, Lewis Hamilton should have only Michael Schumacher ahead of him in the pantheon of F1 greats.
On a day when he stretched his championship lead over Sebastian Vettel to 40 points, with six races left, it was fitting the British racer started to mirror the great German’s dominant style.
His race to win No.7 of the season even left his own technical director marvelling at how he “turns into a machine at this time of year”. Remind you of anyone? In winning seven world crowns in the space of 11 seasons between 1994 and 2004, Schumacher earned rave reviews for a sixth sense that told him when to push harder in a race and when to close the door on the opposition in a season.
Cue the same plaudits for Hamilton. In the strange world of night racing under lights, he did not put a foot wrong, leading most of this race, steering clear of trouble happening around him, and majestically taking the chequered flag, with Max Verstappen second and Vettel back in third. And according to Mercedes
technical director James Allison, Hamilton has now switched to that extra mental gear required to close out a title race. Allison said: “It was a very nervous race for us. All the way through, a safety car could have snatched a well-earned lead from us at any point. “There’s been a slow improvement of our performance in that regard. In the last sector at Budapest, we were strong. Last year, we were dreadful in that sector. We’ve been chipping away at it over the past 12 months. “Lewis got the job done, but we’ve given him the car to do it, and that’s a huge source of pride for us.
“Lewis turns into a machine at this time of year, and he lifts his performance to a level that’s superb to watch.”
Unless he has a spectacular meltdown, Hamilton is going to win his fifth world crown, pulling him level with Argentina’s 1950s great Juan Manuel Fangio, two behind Schumacher.
Hamilton, of course, will take it one race at a time, comb over every detail of each practice session, push to the limit in qualifying.
That is how champions are built. In the oppressive heat of Singapore, he looked and sounded as though he had been through the wringer, regardless of how effortless it looked to the casual spectator.
Hamilton said: “I’m spent! That was a tough race, I have such great support here and we had a great start.
“The team had never given up faith and belief in me and Valtteri Bottas. That was the longest race in my life and it’s a blessing. I’m just blessed.
“I was a little unlucky with the traffic, these guys (Romain Grosjean and Sergey Sirotkin) were moving and it was difficult to follow. “Max was lucky, I think, and the guys wouldn’t let me by. My heart was in my mouth but, once I got past, I could put the pedal down and just had to go.
“The Ferraris put up a good fight this weekend, but I’m not sure where their pace went in the race.
“It’s just special.”