He’s set to achieve our wildest dreams, so what’s with the cheap digs, asks Ben Barry
The British always like to cut people down to size. That’s why, even as a UK driver is set to clinch the Formula 1 crown in his debut season, Lewis Hamilton still has his home-grown detractors. He’s a spoilt brat who hasn’t had to work his way through the field, they say. Let’s put him in a Honda, see how he gets on then.
But whatever you think of Hamilton, yesterday’s race in Japan proved his success so far is no fluke. The rain is a great leveller, and Fuji had it in bucket loads. In fact, wet-weather racing is the nearest Formula 1 – with its vast tarmac run-off, driver aids and aerodynamic assistance – ever gets to the ‘good old days’ of death and fiery destruction. When cars just 50 metres in front are but smeary dots, when 160mph aquaplaning is commonplace and when a multi-car accident would be impossible to avoid, there’s more to racing than just skill and the car beneath you. Nerve becomes a far bigger part of the equation.
That the two pole sitters playing second fiddle to Lewis Hamilton were Finnish – Raikkonen and Kovalainen – speaks volumes. The Finns are notoriously adept at dealing with adverse weather, as we’ve witnessed time after time in rallying. Yet Lewis shrugged off these dangerous conditions with astonishing bravery to draw one step closer to being our first world champion in over ten years. Surely this will once and for all silence the doubters.