LEW CLOCK TICKING

FORMULA 1 Coulthard: He’s ripe to do a Rosberg’ and walk away at end of this season

CHANNEL 4 is the home of free-to-air Formula 1 with live coverage of 10 Grand Prix this season and extended highlights of every race weekend. Highlights from the Australian GP in Melbourne on C4 next Sunday from 2pm. DAVID COULTHARD fears Lewis Hamilton might be very near the time when he simply snaps: “F*** it, I’m off”. Hamilton begins the battle for his fourth drivers’ trophy in Australia next weekend – but this season could be his final lap of the campaign circuit. Coulthard warns that at 32 Lewis’ warrior instinct might do the same vanishing act that saw 2016 champion Nico Rosberg walk away at the end of last season. Rosberg’s quitting sees Hamilton now paired with a new Mercedes team-mate, the Finnish dark horse Valtteri Bottas for 2017. And Channel 4 commentator Coulthard, who won 13 Grands Prix all told, and was runner-up to Michael Schumacher in the 2001 championship, said: “How long before Lewis retires? It could be sooner than maybe we would all want. “I would be surprised if he was still doing it beyond 35 because he started so young. I stopped at 37, but I started later. “Like anything in life, to keep things fresh and exciting over a 10 or 20-year period is tough. “He could ‘do a Rosberg’ and walk away if he wins the title this season, absolutely. switched on from time to time, he’ll continue to show up and do it.

“But when the passion goes, you can fool others but not yourself. That could happen at the end of the year, it may even happen during the season.

“It won’t take much for him to say, for the want of a better phrase, ‘F*** it, I’m off’. He can afford to make that decision.”

Rivalry

Only Schumacher (91) can boast more Grand Prix wins than Hamilton’s 53 – and Coulthard warned there may be few mountains left for Lewis to climb.

Coulthard added: “Every sportsman has his peak, and if he doesn’t stop there then decline will set in.

“The evidence of Bottas at Williams suggests he’s not at the same level as Lewis. But Peter Warr once said Nigel Mansell would never win a Grand Prix ‘as long as there’s a hole in my a***’, and Nigel went on to win a lot.

“Maybe Bottas is going to appear as this winning machine that nobody saw coming – including Hamilton.”

Coulthard believes Hamilton may also miss his rivalry with Rosberg, which often brought out his best competitive instincts. There is no history of enmity between Hamilton and Bottas.

But Coulthard said: “I don’t suppose they really know each other. I never really liked any of my team-mates.

“I get along with Mika Hakkinen now when we bump into each other, but we weren’t buddies at McLaren because his success was my failure and vice-versa.

“Lewis has speed and won’t fear Bottas. What we are losing this year is the light and shade of Nico and Lewis not liking each other.”