F1 Fanatic

I don’t think so: Hamilton is still part of the McLaren team, and giving away a McLaren victory is simply not done, even if that would be the last race for that team.

@andae23 to be fair – I don’t think it Lewis really cares what McLaren thinks after his last McLaren pitstop.

It depends on how faster Alonso will be. If Alonso is able to get in the drs zone and challenge Hamilton…and if they go wheel to wheel… im 100% sure Hamilton will be more gentle and will not make a huge resistance, but if Alosno is slow no absolutely he wouldn’t do it.
In dry condition this is quite impossible to happen due to the fact that ferrari is slower than Mclaren and Red Bull…but in wet condition (without drs) this may happen….

Not a chance in hell.

I find it incredibly tiresome when people project their assumptions about how the drivers view each other onto how they might compete with each other on the track as if this is some silly playground squabble. These are professional racing drivers competing in the pinnacle of motor racing.

There is no way any of those drivers would pass up a victory – victories are just hard to get especially in McLarens;-) Hamilton has just 21 victories in F1 – giving up 1 victory is 5% of his overall number…

The way things are going by age 31 (Alonso’s age) Hamilton is going to have fewer victories than Alonso and fewer WDCs. Poor guy – probably the most disastrous career in F1.

While I wouldn’t call Hamilton’s career disastrous, in some ways I can see where Michael is coming from. Think back to 4 years ago, November 2008. After only 2 years in the sport, Lewis has already won 9 races and a WDC. Currently he is only 23, almost 24 years of age. At this point, people were expecting him to break records after records, to revive the statistics books. Schumacher’s #1 status in achievements were already under threat. Now as we move forward in time, four years later, he is still stuck with one WDC and has left the second most successful team in the history of the sport for the team of Brackley, a team that has never proven to be capable of developing a car throughout the whole season and has killed many careers. He has won a couple of races each year, but ever since his championship winning year he has finished fourth or fifth on every occasion. Be honest, at this point and time we are only hoping that he doesn’t turn into another Jacques V, whose career took a surprisingly identical path to what his has.

Hamilton has not been able live up to the expectations nor has been able to live up to the promise that he once showed when joining F1 – but I do predict that he will win maybe 1 more championship and will still have some glory years, although he will not achieve this with Mercedes.

As I have not answered the OP yet, let’s just get that out of the way: no way in hell.

As for Hamilton’s legacy, it’s hard to say, but I think he’s gone beyond Jacques Villeneuve (though Mercedes will be the definite answer to that, regardless of how good it is). After 2009, I was fearing it might go there, but ’10 and ’12 I believe have shown he has the potential to make the extra step.

There’s a few things to consider really:
- When Villeneuve entered F1, the big names were just Schumacher and Hill. Villeneuve never challenged Hill like Hamilton challenged Alonso, and Alonso is clearly better.
- Villeneuve failed to ‘latch on’ to the big names; 96-97 he was there, beyond there his name was nothing. That was the Schumacher-era, where Michael was taking on a different driver every other year. Hamilton has established him as one of the big names. Yes, Vettel’s been bringing home the gold, but the big three are Vettel, Hamilton and Alonso; it’s not Vettel vs Hamilton, Vettel vs Alonso or Vettel vs Räikkönen. It’s a multi-legend era, and Hamilton’s a big part of it.

If he stops next week, Hamilton will be remembered as one of the best single WDC drivers in history. The best? No perse, but certainly one that will be remembered.