F1 Fanatic

When I say arrogance I’m referring to constantly comparing himself to Ayrton Senna:

“Oh, I’m so happy winning here in Monaco, you know, Ayrton (sic) [notice the first name basis] also won here on the wet

“It’s so good to be able to race here in Suzuka, hmmm that chicane where he and Prost…”

“Alonso is the Prost for my Ayrton”
“Vettel is the new Mansell” -> ok, this is more recent, but yet.

Do I have to argue the bad-tasteness in these comments to the press?

LL, sorry I have to reply as you have taken my quote out of context..

Let me be clear, I think LH’s actions/comments the last couple of years (especially this year) have been poor, boarderline disgraceful, this was not his original manner – at least it did not manifest whilst his Dad was his manager (maybe conicidence, maybe not).

You had statment was… “In 07, 08 we only had arrogance and bad taste coming from his mouth”.. My point is that this perception of Hamilton (being arrogant those seasons) is not accurate at all.. In 2007 the comments from Alonso’s camp were ridiculous. Paronoid and without basis – and it ended in his departure. If this aggrogant streak was correct in Hamilton, why was he not pointing out the obvious point that he beat Alonso.. If I were arrogant I certainly would! The man was the WC at the time and Hamilton out qualified him and scored more points.. In fact I recall hamilton saying how much he was enjoying learning from Alonso. Not arrogant at all..

On the Senna issue, I have followed LH since GP2 days and whilst he always says Ayton is he boyhood hero, rolemodel, inspiration whatever, he has never once ever compared himself to ayton Senna. Others have, but not Hamilton hinself (despite constantly being asked the question). He idealised him and whilst he will compare his achievments in context to Senna’s (and as an F1 WC he can), he always takes the line that he is the guy he wants to be compared to in history. Only time will tell. That’s called having an ambition.

The comments on using Ayton’s christian name.. Please.
As for winning Monaco in the wet? Again some context please… Monaco is iconic, Senna will forever be assoicated with Monaco and LH achieved a lifetime ambition by winning an F1 race there.. Throw in a bit of rain and that it’s in a Maclaren and you are pretty much ticking all the boxes. His hero did it, now he’s done it. In his first victory in Monaco in GP2, he also assoicated Senna with Monaco and said it made the the win more special. He was beginning to walk in the shadow of the great man.. When he sees his name on the same trophy and he’s asked the question, is he meant to say, “Oh I hadn’t really thought about it”

I cannot recall him comparing him and Alonso to Senna an Prost.. Possibly you have also misquoted there – or maybe that was just a silly comment by LH. Don’t know.

Finally, to pick up on “Oh, Saint Logic, where do you go so often?”
You said you stopped short of writing “his filty mouth”. I think you should question how logical this is?

You said you stopped short of writing “his filty mouth”. I think you should question how logical this is?

well, I did question it. In such a way that I didn’t write it.

Possibly you have also misquoted there – or maybe that was just a silly comment by LH.

This sentence sums up your big reply: for you, a quote like that is either false or is excusable for being “silly”, not counting for the arrogance-meter.

Well, let’s clarify things; The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/mar/28/lewis-hamilton-ayrton-senna-alain-prost

I’ll paste the main quote:
“I will always think that my nemesis and my closest rival will always be Fernando,” said an unusually reflective Hamilton. “Just because of my history, when I started out. I see him as my Prost, if we were [Alain] Prost and [Aryton] Senna. If you were to say ‘choose a driver’ [that I would like to be] I would clearly choose Ayrton. And maybe I would put him as Prost.”

And, please, don’t raise up doubts in other people sentences like that with “Possibly, you have misquoted…”, it’s just impolite. If you don’t know it, don’t raise the issue, or if you want to raise it try to inform yourself first.

The comments on using Ayton’s christian name.. Please.

Using the first name, especially in the context he used, implies they have some kind of relationship (they know each other, at least; they are friends, to be more adequate) which is obviously not true. And you say I took it out of context, but you are the one that are trying to do it. No, you are doing worse than decontextualization, you’re trying to insert elements that aren’t there by implying he’s being asked about Ayrton Senna and his mónaco win (he had 6, which one?). Now, I’ll quote the entire speech one can see on the FIA review of Monaco 08, Lewis Hamilton’s speaking:

“When you’re here in F1, it’s the best thing it can happen… It’s incredible how the track can change so many times.. and the car feels good, the car doesn’t feel so good and then it feels good.. this weekend, especially as it dried up, you know, I felt confortable in the lead, but I couldn’t really believe it, I was driving and thinking «ok, Ayrton won in the rain here, and he dominated and I’m forty seconds in the lead and thinking this will be almost like Ayrton’s win», and then safety car come out, but that didn’t matter.”

That’s the speech he gave to the media, no interruptions, no questions about “Ayrton”; I can’t find it on youtube, but to see the facial expressions the man does is really something. So, you’re wrong.

The man was the WC at the time and Hamilton out qualified him and scored more points.

No, you’re wrong, they both scored 109 points.

If this aggrogant streak was correct in Hamilton, why was he not pointing out the obvious point that he beat Alonso.

Again, not pointing out a fact is not a sign of not-arrogance. It’s just… it’s nothing really; remember we’re talking about a non-action. If he pointed out people would think “yeah, we can read the table, thank you”

Ayrton Senna was (is) Michael Schumacher’s idol. Do you want to compare Schumi’s reactions over the time to Hamilton’s? In one side you have one that’s humble to the point of saying that his first championship wasn’t supposed to be his, but Senna’s (at the time, it was the only WDC he had), recognizing, that despite having 20 points of advantage at the time of his death it would probably go to the Williams driver. On the other side, well… I think I’ve written enough about that, right?

It’s a joke, man. When I write:

«I was gonna write “filthy mouth” up there.. LL, don’t get carried away, please!»

obviously I was never really gonna write it. In the same way I’m not really schizophrenic (or whatever the disease of people that talk to themselves is called)

about “I’m Senna, he’s Prost”, first you said I had misquoted, now you say I’m proving your point.. If you look at my initial remark:

“ok, this is more recent, but yet.”

I did contextualized the quote, by saying it wasn’t from that particular period.. but whatever…

then you try to grab to semantics; I continue to say it shows arrogance and bad taste, it showed then (07/08) and it shows now.

Yes, I know the points position regarding Alonso and I think you are fully aware of the point I was making.

No, you had said before “The man was the WC at the time and Hamilton out qualified him and scored more points.”; hence, my confusion (oh, and here I’m not really confused, ok? I’m just being ironic, because you wrote two different things about the points the McLaren drivers had at the end of the Championship).

Adding to this, my experience and formation don’t allow me to believe a person can change his personality like you seem to believe.. It’s kind of naive, you know? but nothing wrong with that.

Catlady-itis, lol. that was good.

But my view is that without his Dad’s guidance, we are seeing a young guy living a playboy’s lifestyle and losing direction (a little like I think Jenson was guilty off about 5/6 seasons back)..

Kearnsie, although your reply was meant for LL, I thought I’d jump in here and have a say myself. I’ve been following this thread and wondering from the original post on if it would lead anywhere sensible. I was skeptical back then, and I’m even more of a doubter now.

Right now, we’re at the point where the discussion has gone iceskating from possible difficult intra-team communication and/or limitation of direct input by Hamilton himself (such as choosing a race engineer he’d appear to like/be comfortable with/consider as a real team mate) to his Hollywood Representing Wassup Mah Posse lifestyle. I’m not sure if this type of argument is playing in Hamilton’s favour at all. Even if every son wants to wrestle away from his father’s control and power at some point in their life (oh, Oedipus, the egg/chicken of all human tragedy, where art thou?), the problem you bring up here is about personal dedication to one’s passion, responsabilities, control and making the right (or at the very least the better) choices. When you compare Hamilton to some of his F1 peers who are his age and are not managed by their father, there are no “young men will be young men” excuses, alas. Look at his current peeve, Vettel. No father managing him, no music video lifestyle, no bling-bling, no public image recognition quest and yet lots of wins. Irritating, is it not?

To quote the great Albus Dumbledore (not that he cared about F1 the slighest mind you, such a muggle sport!): “It is our choices [...] that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

Kearnsie,

As I’m on my lunch break and just saw your reply pop up, I thought I might as well reply straight away (before I forget what I meant to say).
I’ll even make a list. Just for clarity’s sake:

1. The anti-Hamilton craze is definitely not as strong on this blog/forum as it may be in other F1 circles. Sure, people are unhappy with some of the very silly things he said and very silly moves he has made but no one is denying the boy any racing talent. It just boils down to this: “Shut up, Lewis, drive and show us. Don’t tell us you’re going to win and your team is a serious threat for Red Bull, spoil it and then claim you didn’t even think you’d make P3 at the end of Quali. It’s just nonsensical.” I think everyone is rooting to see the former LH come back and for him to shake off the rock-da-baby-cradle-da-baby-by-the-way-who’s-da-baby?-I’m-da-baby attitude and nail it.

2. To say that Lewis has had the “wrong people” around him sounds a little too easy and almost like a way to excuse him. I’m all for understanding circumstances and putting things into perspective but if there is a limit to my compassion and nurturing instinct, it’s what I call the Lindsay Lohan syndrome. You cannot continue excusing someone’s behaviour because they continue to surround themselves by bad people. At one point, it is their choice. They’re not kept captive, they haven’t been kidnapped or brainwashed into this. It’s not a cult. It’s free will and some serious ego issues that lead to this sort of “people picking”. Hamilton has chosen who can be around him and who he will pay to say whatever he wants to hear. That’s it, voilà. This is where I can’t look past him at the moment. He needs to clean up the act he put together all by himself over the past couple of years.

3. Managing someone is often a matter of business opportunities. It’s not “looking out for someone like a real friend/parent would do”, alas. Some drivers on the F1 grid manage themselves which is actually very smart of them as long as they have a good strong head on their shoulders and aren’t too silly in the brain bucket. They negotiate on their own terms and keep the poker face up while giving some serious evidence of their worth on the track. One of them, oh surprise, is Vettel. He isn’t making the best salary out there but he probably has very different conditions in mind when it comes to drawing up a contract (such as an exclusive condition for his seat being Newey designing the car) rather than raking in the big bucks. Right now, the celeb lifestyle of Lewis Hamilton is definitely spearheaded by acquiring money. This is typical for celebrity management companies: it’s what they do. A celebrity is a celebrity: it’s as vague a definition as you’ll ever get in the world of the publicly recognised characters… It all boils down to this: their offer is to represent anyone who’s really well known in the public eye, and voilà. Hamilton is no exception. And he has not been wipped up with a creamy different story by them. He clearly stepped over to the side of this particular lifestyle. It can’t come as a surprise that he’s currently frustrated and has no proper long term perspective in F1 that we kow of. He is literally cashing in on him being Lewis Hamilton rather than working on becoming Lewis Hamilton. He says he wants to win all the time, we’d rather actually hear that he wants to be a champion. Real ambition goes beyond what is on the table for today.

4. Back to his current nemesis, Vettel. I don’t agree with the fact that Hamilton’s change in attitude & lifestyle has been the opportunity for Vettel to waltz in and shine. I think Vettel would shine a lot more already would he be battling it out fiercely with the likes of Hamilton. Say what you will, but Vettel isn’t that much liked. Sure, everybody recognises he deserves to be the World Champion (or almost everyone, that is) and that he is a worthy multiple GP winner, however, he is also considered as being a bit unchallenged with some pushing forward the “Kinky Kylie is the ultimate car” argument (which is not the topic of this discussion anyhoodle). Vettel would have lots more of non 15 year old Bieber girl fanatics and more proper F1 supporters with a worthy opponent. On top of that, I’m pretty sure Vettel would have found his way onto the number 1 step even if Hamilton had not gone wandering about Hollywood Boulevard. Vettel’s plan was tightly linked to Red Bull from the start, not to the rest of the grid. As a matter of fact, he’s probably one of the few guys out there who wouldn’t lose any amount of sleep over what happens to/with his fellow F1 racers. He’s way too focused on becoming one of the great champions. Now if we could magically transfer this thought into Hamilton’s head…