Throughout the difficult 2007 season, McLaren insisted that Lewis was always given exactly the same equipment as his team-mate Fernando Alonso.
Born in the picturesque English hamlet of Stevenage in 1985, Lewis Carl Davidson Hamilton was named after the American sprinter Carl Lewis and the legendary British easy listening DJ David Hamilton. He has since moved to Switzerland and attempted to distance himself from association with David Hamilton.
Hamilton famously approached McLaren boss Ron Dennis at the Autosport Awards in 1995 and told him that he wanted to race for him one day. Dennis told the ten-year-old Hamilton to call him in a few years and thus was a mutually rewarding relationship forged. Some of the more disreputable members of the
dotdotdotcomma staff have since adopted a similar strategy in approaching girls in clubs, although they have yet to demonstrate a level of success anything like Hamilton managed.
On his way to F1, Hamilton picked up titles in karting, Formula Renault UK, the F3 Euroseries and GP2, after which he picked up Nicole Scherzinger, who was apparently already a well-known singer with girl band Pussycat Dolls, but who first came to the attention of the
dotdotdotcomma editorial team for wearing a really smashing dress during the title-deciding race at Brazil in 2008 and then jumping about in it quite a lot.
Hamilton's time in F1 has been far from dull and he has shown almost as much ill-conceived misjudgement as he has jaw-dropping ability. The audacious overtaking moves and lightning pace have been accompanied by pit-lane crashes and overly optimistic first-lap lunges, as well as more than his fair share of FIA wrist-slaps.
The decision to strip him of his win at Spa in 2008, seemingly for being too good at overtaking Kimi Raikkonen, still baffles those of us who don't wear Ferrari T-shirts.
