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Formula 1: Lewis Hamilton boring? Wake up and smell the tyre rubber!

While both Hamilton and Michael Schumacher are stupendously quick drivers, the current scenario makes the young Brit's drives far more interesting than the German's sleep-inducing races of the early 2000s.

by Dr. Akshay Nair on 19 May 2008

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Lewis Hamilton: Anything but boring (gettyimages.com)

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Lewis Hamilton has rejuvenated Formula 1 and has had such an explosive start that people are already starting to wonder if he will monopolise the sport like Michael Schumacher did.

Hamilton has certainly renewed Britain’s interest in Formula 1. David Coulthard is probably past his sell-by date, Jenson Button is saddled with a poorly-performing Honda, and Anthony Davidson’s F1 dream ended rather abruptly.

Hamilton has given English fans a reason to be happy: 15 podium finishes, seven pole positions and five wins. And all of this in just 22 races. So is he in danger of becoming as boring as Schumacher?

'Hamilton is good, but the competition is cut-throat. Gone are the days when Schumacher could steamroll the competition and decide the championship with six races still left - as he did in 2002'

No way! With all due respect to Schumacher - he was the most dominating driver of his time - the monotony he brought to Formula 1 made the sport, well, a tad boring.

No doubt when the challenge rose, he was up to it and made even the most impossible tasks seem ridiculously simple. But not all the blame can fall squarely on the shoulders of Schumacher for making the proceedings dull.

Look at the competition he had from 1998–2004. Barring the "Flying Finn" Mika Hakkinen, who beat Michael quite consistently, there was nobody who could stand up to him. Damon Hill only occasionally challenged, whilst a very erratic Juan Pablo Montoya looked like destined to win on some days, but looked as if he were driving a Minardi on others.

A relatively sedate Coulthard almost always seemed content with second place in his unreliable McLaren, while Jacques Villeneuve only came close to Schumacher in a faster car in 1997.

To make things easier for Schuey, Rubens Barrichello was contractually obliged to help him win. Nobody will forget the terrible 2002 Austrian Grand Prix where the subject of "team orders" reared its ugly head and denied Rubens a fair victory.

Does anybody think the class of 2008 is anything like as monotonous as this? Absolutely not! There are currently three top teams - Ferrari, McLaren and BMW Sauber - with fabulous cars, and two others in Williams and Red Bull who are constantly improving. There are brilliant drivers who can win from any position on the grid. Who said anything about F1 being boring!

Lewis Hamilton is good, but the competition is cut-throat. Gone are the days when Schumacher could steamroll the competition and decide the championship with six races still left - as he did in 2002.

Things aren’t so easy now with two champions on the prowl in the form of Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso. Then there's Felipe Massa constantly improving and, with an equally-adept team-mate in Heikki Kovalainen, Hamilton cannot afford to take any race for granted.

No matter how accomplished Hamilton looks, the fact remains that he is still low on experience. His main competitors - Raikkonen and Massa - have driven far more races in different scenarios and are certainly better equipped to deal with pressure.

With teams and drivers so evenly matched in the current scenario, let alone a one-season-old Lewis Hamilton, I'm pretty sure even the great Michael Schumacher wouldn’t have been able to replicate his success.

Boring? You've got to be kidding! Thanks to Hamilton this is the best that Formula 1 has ever been. If only Schuey had stayed for one more season to give us a glimpse of the Schumacher v Hamilton battle!

Comments (10)

by Dhiraj N on May 19, 2008

This is an utterly biased article. Hamilton is yet to win a single world championship and Dr Akshay is already comparing him with arguably the greatest ever driver in the history of the sport. We've seen and read a number of tirades against Schumacher's achievements, time and again, the most amusing one is "the lack of competition", ignoring the fact that Schumacher was the catalyst for raising the Ferrari team from a nothing team to a dominating one in 4 years of blood sweat and tears between 96-99. The standards of F1 drivers were not any less in the 90's than those of today. It is a misplaced myth. Schumacher was just that much better than his rivals. A good example of comparison is Felipe Massa who is giving Kimi Raikkonen a real hard time in Ferrari and this same Massa struggled to come anywhere near Schumacher when Schumacher was in his swansong season. Please talk of Hamilton and his achievements when he actually has acheived something. He is a fantastic prospect no doubt, but dont use him as an excuse to bash Michael Schumacher who's biggest mistake was that he was too good for 16 years on the trot !

by Akshay Nair on May 19, 2008

I have said that MS was the best ever but there is NO doubt that the competition was hardly as good as it is now. Also things like contractually making Barrichello help MS win diluted Michael's efforts. And Massa giving Raikkonen a hard time? you have got to be kidding! Massa hasnt been able to win a single race where he hasnt been on pole. He cannot and will not even come close to troubling Raikkonen. All I am saying that Michael's unbelievable consistency and greatness had made F1 a bit boring and that something like that is certainly not going to happen with evenly matched drivers of today. Peace

by James Cliffard on May 20, 2008

Hamilton sucks he is no gentleman, he always says the wrong thing... and he naggs his fellow racers. Which is very distasteful and unprofessional. I hope he never wins a championship.

by Donald Walker on May 20, 2008

Honestly... I think that Hamilton has a long way to go as far as Formula one goes. He was getting a lot of help from dirty Denis last season, especially so from his teammate the safety-car. There is so many better drivers right now... Kimi, Alonso, I would be bold enough to say that Pedro Delarosa would be comparable to Hamilton. He did a good job for the team when Montoya go the boot. If I recall it was in 06. In short people are jumping on a bandwagon which is Lewis Hamilton and he has done absolutely nothing as of yet. and I always found MS to be very entertaining driver and Lewis cannot be compared to MS right now and probably never it takes something special like Alonso who beat MS 2 years in a row with a Renault.

by Rahul Saxena on May 20, 2008

I think it very unfair on the drivers that were in Schumacher's era by saying that they did not threaten them.Lets not forget that Raikonnen,Massa and Alonso were already there when he won his championships from 2001-2004.Regarding Rubens being contactually obliged to help Schumi...no driver ever signs a contract to be a no 2...the fact that Schumi was miles ahead of him in championship race was the reason for Barichello to support schumi.Barichello was never a championship material ,he can not beat Jenson button in the same cr..where is the question of him being equal to Michal? Also Team orders are part and parcel of F1.in 1999 Schumi gifted the malyasian grand prix to his ferrari team mate Eddie Irvine.Even Mclaren drivers have had team orders..the ones between mika and couldthard or even last year in Monaco when Hamilton was told to back off and not try to win from Alonso??....7 championships is not a joke and lets admit that Schumi was simply above anybody else and that was the sole reason of his dominance rather than lack of competition.

by Sally Proudlock on May 23, 2008

What is wrong with people who run Lewis Hamilton down?He is the most amazing thing to happen to Formula 1 for years! Lewis is so natural and doesnt seem to be getting at all spoilt by all the attention. Add to that he is so so talented and has given a new interest to so many people - myself included - when formula 1 had got (dare I say it?) boring. All the best Lewis!

by Dhiraj N on May 24, 2008

I have said that MS was the best ever but there is NO doubt that the competition was hardly as good as it is now. Also things like contractually making Barrichello help MS win diluted Michael's efforts. And Massa giving Raikkonen a hard time? you have got to be kidding! Massa hasnt been able to win a single race where he hasnt been on pole. He cannot and will not even come close to troubling Raikkonen. All I am saying that Michael's unbelievable consistency and greatness had made F1 a bit boring and that something like that is certainly not going to happen with evenly matched drivers of today. Peace

Absolutely disagree. You discount a lot of major facts in this article : Schumacher won 3 championships in an era where there was no TC and little electronic aids. You have to only watch races like Spain 96,Spa 96,Monaco 97, Spa 97, Spa 98, to see how he dominated over his rivals in wet conditions. In all these years he never had the best car (96-97-98) but took the championship down to the wire by pure driving skills. He was up against a very strong Williams team between 92-97, a team which had the best of Adrian Newey and Co's design efforts. In 98/00 he had immense competition from Hakkinen. Murray Walker has also clearly stated on a number of occasions that he thought the 2000 Mclaren was a better car than the Ferrari. In 2003 he had tough competition from Mclaren,Williams and Renault playing the joker (not to forget their use of blatantly illegal Michelin tyres that year). He has had a couple of good years where he had the best car. So what ? Senna(88-91),Mansell(92), Prost(93),Hill(96),JV(97), Hakkinen(98) all had dominating cars in their time and Schumacher has raced against all of these rivals. And if you really think Kimi is not being given a hard time by Massa, I suggest you broaden your horizons. Kimi has been well and truly upstaged in qualifying last year and even more so this year. Massa demolished Kimi in the entire first half of 2007, and gave him a pasting in a number of races since as well : US,Turkey,Brazil (where he was asked to move over), Bahrain,Spain this year as well.Massa did that only a couple of times in 06 against an ageing Schumacher. Dont come up with the no.1,no.2 tirade again because it is obvious that a team will support someone who is capable of beating his teammate 9 times out of 10 in the same car. That is what Schumacher did to his teammates. Schumacher was outqualified by his teammates a total of less than 10 times in the first 8 years of his career. Now that is something. Schumacher didnt get no.1 status in a team because he looked hansome :) He got it because he could destroy any driver in the same car and there is hardly any doubt in people's minds that Kimi Raikkonen's reputation would have been tattered if Schumacher had continued for another year alongside him. Again, Hamilton has about 10 years of racing and atleast 3 championships to win before he can be mentioned in the same line as Schumacher. This is an attention mongering piece in my opinion. Nothing more !

by Dhiraj N on May 24, 2008

-Berger was Senna's lapdog in 91, -Prost was undisputed no.1 in Williams in 93, -Heinz H Fretzen was asked to move over a couple of times for Villenueve in 97, - Mika Hakkinen was the benificiary a number of times in 97-98-99 because David Coulthard was no.2 in the Mclaren team (something Coulthard has spoken about recently, and TBH you just need to refresh your memory about Jerez 97 and Adelaide 98 to clear this up) -David Coulthard has also helped Kimi Raikkonen towards the end of 2003 in a few races where he was given inferior strategies and he was used as a guinea pig in many races to 'test' tyres in the middle of a race. -Fernando Alonso has received help from Fisichella atleast on 4-5 occasions (Most blaringly evident : China & Germany 2006), in his 2 WDC winning years at Renault. - Hell even J.M Fangio got help from his teammates on a few occasions ! Its only when Schumacher gets help, it 'dilutes' his achievements. Maybe in your eyes, yes. But not in the eyes of most others. And in a career that had 91 wins, Schumacher had about 4 races handed to him by his teammates. I can sleep with that any day ;)

by Richard Lion on June 03, 2008

I hate F1 these days, all the commentators talk about is Lewis... You don't get a good overview of the race it should be called the Lewis Race Hour. I do not agree with Sally, how is he amazing any can be good with the right car.... take Alonso for example he beat MS 2 years in a row with a clunker and hes is the youngest 2 time champion. Besides Denis and the safety car were helping lewis all last year. Notably in Montreal and Indianapolis. There was alot questionable things that went on last season regarding alonso's car and favoratism. Such as an illegal crane lift for lewy.... And in Brazil Lewis's car had 11 more horse power than alonso and he still didnt manage to get by him. I quote Dirty Dennis on this one "we are not racing Ferrari we are racing Fernando"

by Subramaniam Ragurajan on June 10, 2008

Shumy is still best thing that had ever happened to F1. With traction control or without traction control - he was still the man to beat. People who don't know much about F1 but then when u say Shumy - everyone knows him. Think about it.