EmailSilverstone, 11 June 2006. With England in the grip of World Cup fever, the crowd for the British Grand Prix is expected to be down on recent years. There is little likelihood of any home success in the main event. Still, the stands and spectator banks are starting to fill up slowly as the GP2 race starts at 9am. Lewis Hamilton has started down in eighth place, but he is working his way through the field, with characteristic aggressive driving.
He is soon closing on the squabble for second place. Brazil's Nelson Piquet Junior and the Monegasque driver Clivio Piccione go through Copse side by side at around 140mph, but, as they accelerate out of the corner, they are suddenly three wide as Hamilton draws alongside. Into the five sweeping bends that make up the daunting Becketts complex they go, with Piquet on the inside. Hamilton carries huge momentum around the outside of the first left-hander to claim the racing line and second place as the road goes right then left again; Piquet drives straight through a temporary advertising hoarding. The cheers from the crowd are by far the loudest of the weekend as the young driver, then known only to hardcore petrolheads, picks off the leader and cruises to victory. Unknown he no longer is: 'Lewis Hamilton + Silverstone' is now one of the most popular searches on YouTube.
Had Britain's latest sporting hero-in-waiting heard the excitement of the crowd?
'I didn't, no,' he said afterwards. 'It all went silent at that point because we were so close, and I don't know if my body was preparing for something. You know when, if you're going to crash, your body gets ready to protect itself? I felt my body and the adrenaline all building up ready for something, and when I came out it all relaxed, kind of saying, "Phew, thank God for that".
'I'm working my arse off,' he continued, 'not only to do the best job possible, but also to get that seat at McLaren. I really want that. It's an opportunity not many people get. If I can get that seat then I think - and I feel very confident - that I can make best use of it.'
A little under a year later, Hamilton not only has that seat at McLaren but, when we meet soon after his second place in the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona, he is leading the Formula One drivers' championship. Today, however, he is back doing the unseen graft of testing. Along with the other 10 teams that contest the world championship, McLaren have moved on from Barcelona to the Paul Ricard circuit near Marseille in the south of France. The former home of the French Grand Prix is now simply a test track, albeit about the most sophisticated in the world - as you would expect from a facility owned by Bernie Ecclestone, the billionaire ringmaster of Formula One. Everything is of the highest standard and, just as the proprietor would like, the team vehicles are lined up so precisely they would do justice to the contents of David Beckham's fridge.
At the back of a grey McLaren bus, sheltered from the warm Mistral wind, sits Lewis Hamilton. It is 12 hours since testing began and he has driven 98 laps, posted the fastest time by more than a second and been through a two-and-a-half-hour debrief with his engineers. For a short while he is alone, staring at a computer screen with a diagram of the circuit and a screed of data on it. Not all his work is at 190mph and in front of 140,000 people.
After the excitement of a grand prix, testing must seem like a chore. Does it make him a better racer?
'I don't think so,' he says, preparing to close the laptop. 'You get that crafting from karting, the wheel-to-wheel racing you have there.' Karting is where most successful racing drivers first turn a wheel in anger; the competition is ferocious.
'The more racing you do the more you learn,' Hamilton continues. 'I'm a racer naturally, so that's why I believe I'm good in the races. In the race it's all about consistency, and to get consistency you need to learn about the car and that comes from testing. But the test is mainly to build your awareness of what is around you, that you are understanding the car and to fine tune the car and yourself. Sometimes I don't make any changes to the car and I find half a second in myself. Some people find it really difficult, like the engineers, they say, "What can we do?" and I say, "Don't do anything. I quite like the car as it is, I just need to improve myself."'
Hamilton is seeking to improve skills that have seen him make a record-breaking start to his F1 career. He finished third in his first race, the Australian Grand Prix, then second in Malaysia and Bahrain - a record run on the podium for a rookie, which he extended in Spain to become the youngest driver to lead the world championship.
At last Sunday's Monaco Grand Prix, Hamilton finished second yet again, this time behind his McLaren team-mate, double world champion Fernando Alonso. But there were signs of frustration from the young Englishman at a victory missed, as he slipped to second in the title race. Hamilton was called in for his first pit stop earlier than he expected, just as he was preparing to put in some really quick laps to extend his advantage over Alonso, who had already stopped.
'I was actually quite surprised because I was fuelled to do five laps, maybe six laps, longer than Fernando and they stopped me with three laps to go,' Hamilton said after the race. 'There wasn't much time to pull out a gap or improve my time; I wasn't really given much time for it. I came in two or three laps after him [Alonso]. That was unfortunate, but that's the way it goes. I've got number two on my car, I am the number two driver, it is something I have to live with.'
McLaren's team principal, Ron Dennis, rebutted allegations of team orders and race manipulation, strictly against F1 rules since 2002 when Ferrari instructed Rubens Barrichello to allow Michael Schumacher past to win the Austrian Grand Prix. 'We are scrupulously fair at all times in how we run this grand prix team,' he said. 'We will never favour one driver, no matter who it is. We don't have team orders, we had a strategy to win this race. There will be places where they will be absolutely free to race, but this isn't one of them.'
That last line attracted the attention of the FIA, the sport's governing body, who started investigating 'incidents' concerning the McLaren team during the race.
Since his debut in Melbourne on 18 March, Hamilton has transformed the popularity of grand-prix racing, not least because he is young, British, good looking and thrillingly fast. He is also mixed race in a sport that is overwhelmingly white; inevitably, he has been compared with Tiger Woods. 'I've never seen a rookie as good as him,' says Damon Hill. 'Nobody has. He's coped with everything he's faced. He's been superb.'
Triple world champion Sir Jackie Stewart is equally impressed. 'I think Lewis is going to rewrite the book,' he said recently. 'We'll see a new generation of what I call properly prepared, professional racing drivers. I'm talking about fully rounded; [Michael] Schumacher became that, but even Schumacher wasn't as good as he should have been, not in terms of the driving but the total package. I believe Lewis will create the benchmark for a whole generation of drivers. Niki Lauda and James Hunt changed the culture of racing drivers, but they weren't role models. They said nothing, didn't give a damn. Lewis Hamilton can become a role model.'
Even the unflappable Bernie Ecclestone is excited by Hamilton. 'He's got a lot of talent,' he says. 'The guy's a winner. It became clear pretty quickly that he will win a grand prix some time - sooner rather than later. He'll win the championship - but I don't think this year. It would be asking a bit much and be a lot of pressure to expect that. It would be fantastic if he did, but I don't think we should talk about that at this stage.'
It is impossible when meeting Hamilton not <to be impressed or struck by just how young and fresh-faced he is, even when dressed up in McLaren T-shirt and jacket. He is courteous, intelligent, engaged and never loses eye contact, even if you sense that, as we talk, he would rather be getting on with some hardcore data analysis. He speaks of his time on the practice circuit with relish. 'It is quite satisfying when you go out and you know that you needed to brake 10 metres later ... building up the courage to brake those 10 metres later, not lock up the tyres, and really pull it off. Sometimes you go into a corner and you think, "I'm not going to make it," but you say, "OK, we're going to do it." And you do it and you think, "Shoot, what was the big fuss in the first place," but you think about the advantage you've gained when you exit the corner - you're like, "Yeah, that was good." It's an amazing feeling.'
A grand-prix team can take more than 100 personnel to a race and that doesn't include the test team who work away from the public gaze. Hamilton is eager to acknowledge that there are others who contribute to his success. 'Sometimes you don't even notice the changes the engineer has made,' he says. 'My engineer is so smart and he understands what I say and the way I communicate - that's a great feeling. When someone understands what you're talking about and is able to translate that into your car, it runs better.'
Hamilton has been supported by McLaren since Ron Dennis recruited him into the team's driver development programme as a 13-year-old in 1998. The team contributed as much as £5m to his career, and offered technical support and advice as he worked his way up to the junior formulas. He graduated to racing cars in 2001 and has won the championship in every series he has driven. The step to F1 was a natural progression and everything was done - including keeping him distant from the media - to ensure that Hamilton was as prepared as possible. He has appeared at the obligatory press conferences, but has never before done an interview.
'I am amazed and proud to be here,' he says now, 'and I'm learning all the time. As soon as I signed for the team they sent a steering wheel round to my house so I could learn all the controls and the sequences for the start. I just kept it in my lap. When I got to the first race, I wasn't nervous about the start because I knew everything.'
McLaren made sure Hamilton was physically prepared and it is hard to imagine anyone looking fitter. Countless trips to the gym ensured that he would develop the strength and stamina to cope with the rigours of racing an F1 car for up to two hours in extreme heat.
'It was extremely exciting to do all the training,' Hamilton says. 'There was a point where we were doing all the same things over and over again, but then we started changing things and it became exciting again. You wouldn't believe what it's like in the car, the forces that are on you. I finish every race with a black ...' - he pauses, half smiles and then continues - ' ...a darker line down my side where I've been pushed against the seat. But the race is the most exciting part, the first corner, the first pit stop. I am just going to get stronger and stronger. I'm not yet at my best.'
Hamilton, who was born on 7 January 1985 in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, has been immersed in motor racing since the age of eight. His parents, Carmen and Anthony, separated when he was two, and he lived with his mother until he was 10, before moving in with his father and stepmother Linda. A day out with his dad to Rye House kart track, a few miles south of Stevenage, changed the path of his life. He had already been karting and proved to be a natural, soon lapping his father, but now he decided that racing was what he wanted to do. A deal was struck between father and son: if Lewis worked hard at school, Anthony would support his son's karting.
Anthony was working as an IT manager as Lewis began making a name for himself on the kart circuit. Taking time off became a problem as his son's racing and testing took him all over the country and overseas. Eventually Anthony took redundancy so he could spend more time at the track. He did contract work and was sometimes doing two or three jobs at a time, including putting up estate agents' signs. In time, he set up his own computer company, which now employs 25 people, but his main role in life is working as his son's manager on a daily basis.
'If I didn't love it, I'm sure I wouldn't be as good as I am today because I'd have put half the effort in and just have done the races,' Lewis says, recalling the time he spent testing in his early karting days. 'I think you find drivers who just rely on their racing ability and don't do the hard yards. When you're young you don't really understand that philosophy: work hard and see the result. You think, "I can't be bothered to work hard now," and when you get there you struggle and complain. But if you really put the effort in you see the result. Even if you don't do well you know you've done the work, so next time you can improve on it.'
As soon as Hamilton started competing, the results were spectacular. Adam Jones, a journalist and ex-racer who now runs 100ccPR, an agency that deals in public relations for kart racers, remembers meeting Hamilton in 1994. 'Martin Howell, who owned the Playscape indoor kart track in Clapham, introduced us. He said, "Adam, this is Lewis - he's going to be a Formula One world champion." I shook his hand and said, "You're going to be a grand-prix champion, eh?" and Lewis looked at me and said, "Yes, I am." I thought, "Yeah, right." What struck me wasn't Lewis's steely determination but Martin's tone. He wasn't patronising Lewis or me; he meant what he said. Every magazine or newspaper article about Lewis mentions his karting background, but what they fail to say is just how good he was back in those days. Lewis hasn't just suddenly arrived; he's been around a long time.'
Michael Eboda is editor of the New Nation, the newspaper aimed at Britain's black community. He recalls arriving at Buckmore Park kart track in Kent to interview Hamilton and his father for The Observer in 1997. 'I got there and asked someone where I could find Lewis Hamilton. They said, "He's the only black kid here and he'll be about three laps ahead of everyone else." He was.' Eboda remembers the 12-year-old Hamilton as being polite and assured as they chatted in the back of a beaten-up old Peugeot hire car. He didn't want his father with him as they talked, but Eboda was more than a little surprised by the answer when he asked how Hamilton drives a kart so fast. 'I don't know why I'm so quick,' Lewis had said. 'When I come to a corner the answer just comes. I take what the answer says and it makes me take it as quickly as possible.'
He has always gone as quickly as possible. Kieran Crawley is boss of M-Sport, one of Britain's leading kart teams, and worked with the Hamiltons as Lewis made his way up through the karting levels. He remembers a race in Belgium, when Lewis was competing in the Junior Intercontinental A class, that proved just how quick he could be. 'Lewis was always stalling the kart, but you were allowed to wait by the side of the track with an engine starter. As they rolled on to the grid I could see Lewis looking for me. I thought, "Oh no, he's stalled it." I got the starter into the side pod just as the lights went to green. Lewis went off from the back of the grid and was already half a lap down. He caught the pack and went through it to finish fourth. He was up against some very good drivers - including Robert Kubica, the Pole who is now an F1 driver for BMW - and beat them. In F1 we haven't seen him come from the back, but that's when he's at his most dangerous. When he makes mistakes, just watch him go. I want to see him make some mistakes - then you'll see just how good he is.'
Does Hamilton relish the thought of charging through from the back after a mistake? It must happen one day soon in F1, as it did in Istanbul last year, in GP2, when he spun and worked his way up from 16th to second.
'I rarely make mistakes in races,' he says. 'In Istanbul that was one of the few mistakes I've ever made.'
But surely it was worth it?
'It was,' he says, smiling. 'It was great, but I was struggling in the car. The rear end was not right. Straight after that [the spin] I somehow extracted a little bit more from the tyres and I had this boost and everything's right, the car was great and things need to be ...'
Momentarily he is lost in the memory of that epic drive. 'Look at Kimi [Raikkonen] in Japan in 2005, when he came from the back. Everything was right, the car was fantastic and he got out of trouble when he did some of the most amazing moves you've ever seen. He was buzzing, he enjoyed it and he won. I love those experiences. I love coming from the back.'
Hamilton's physical gifts don't just belong behind the wheel of a racing car. He took up karate after he caught the eye of the school bully. By the age of 12, he was a black belt. He was also a more-than-useful footballer at John Henry Newman School in Stevenage and played in the same team there as Ashley Young, the England under-21 midfielder who joined Aston Villa from Watford in January for £9.65m. 'I was quicker than Ashley Young, stronger than him, so I had that with me. But he was very skilled and very neat and would dribble the ball round people very nicely. I was very powerful in the team, I was always a midfielder and in my team I was the fittest by far because of my racing and the training I did. I'd run up and down and up and down and if someone tackled me I'd get them back. I'd always get them back because I never gave up, whereas a lot of people would get tackled then just leave it for the next stage of the game. I'd never let that happen.'
Like all top sportsmen, Hamilton is hugely competitive, whether in a racing car or out ten-pin bowling with his mother. Do all the fun things in life involve keeping score?
'I think at a young age everything I did competitively I wanted to win, and I hated not being the best at any sport I did. When I competed against anyone I thought, "I've got to win." But I've got to a point now that I play golf and I lose, and I can deal with it. It's not a negative energy, I can control that energy.'
So does he let his mother win at bowling?
'I don't ever let anyone win if I'm honest,' he says. 'I should let my brother win at some things, but it's very hard for me to do that.'
He is referring to his half-brother, Nicholas, who is 15 and has cerebral palsy. The two are extremely close. 'I always wanted a brother and I remember when my parents [as he always refers to his father and step-mother] first told me they were going to have a boy, I was well excited. It's quite a cool feeling to watch someone grow up, to see the difficulties and troubles he's had, the experience he's had. To go through them with him and see how he pulls out of them. I think he's just an amazing lad and I really love to do things for him. This weekend we're going racing remote-control cars. We bought him a new one, then I bought one so we can race together. I've been a couple of times and I get hassled a little bit now, but I had my dad to take me and he doesn't have time, so when I do have time I love to just take my brother down to the track. He loves a challenge and he's got a lot steeper challenges.'
The future for Lewis Hamilton has limitless possibilities. He will win many grands prix and world championships, perhaps even more than the seven titles that Michael Schumacher won before he retired at the end of 2006. He will very soon be improbably wealthy, even if, for now, his salary is reported to be £500,000 a season (team-mate Fernando Alonso is rumoured to earn 20 times as much). Dominic Curran, a director of Karen Earl Sponsorship, believes Hamilton has the potential to earn hundreds of millions of pounds. 'He has arrived with about as big a bang as possible,' Curran says. 'He's got something different - he's the first black F1 driver - which opens up a whole new market for him. Plus, he has charisma and star quality, he's a good-looking guy who speaks well, which is attractive to sponsors. And he's clean-cut.'
What does Hamilton think of all this? How does he see himself in the future? 'I think when I'm done I'd just like to go back to living a normal life and have a family and no worries,' he says. 'Just enjoy doing things with my brother. There's a lot of experiences in life which I haven't had yet, and doing that with him and doing that with my friends and not having the worries, just enjoying. It's such an important thing.'
How does he account for being so calm and grounded?
'It comes from my parents, yeah, and being taught to appreciate things. I was like every kid, you know. You get in trouble ... I liked living life on the edge but I was always taught to appreciate things and say "thank you". I got that from my dad but also from my mum. A lot of my personality comes from my mum. It's a real half and half.'
At McLaren there is nothing but praise for their record-breaking recruit. 'I could launch into a whole range of eulogies,' says Ron Dennis. 'You just need to look at the history of F1 to see how his debut compares. How could anyone expect a start like this? And it's not just what he does on the track but it's what he says and how he says it. You have the impression that here is a guy who will keep his feet on the ground. He has enough Brownie points to avoid criticism if something goes wrong - which it will. It's inevitable for any driver. But you have the feeling that Lewis will be able to cope with that too.'
The team's chief executive, Martin Whitmarsh, knows exactly just how good Hamilton is. 'Since I joined McLaren in 1989, I've worked with a lot of great drivers, including [Alain] Prost, [Ayrton] Senna, Mika Hakkinen and now Fernando Alonso. It's pretty clear that Lewis ticks all the necessary boxes. It's too early to analyse, but if the trend continues there is no reason why he could not become the greatest driver ever.'
Hamilton's influence is extending far beyond the insular world of F1. Michael Eboda, of New Nation, can already see the impact he is having on black Britons. 'He's incredibly popular and, for the want of a better expression, he's a fantastic role model, as is his dad. It sends out a message to people that that is the way to bring up a kid.'
McLaren are excessively protective of their new star, in a manner reminiscent of how Alex Ferguson once chaperoned the young Ryan Giggs at Manchester United. This interview took many months to negotiate, and there were many stipulations on what I could and could not ask Hamilton - such as about race and ethnicity or indeed whether he intended, like most F1 drivers, to become a tax exile. At the Spanish Grand Prix meeting last month Hamilton had mentioned that he might one day have to move to Switzerland for tax reasons, but his father quickly killed the story.
McLaren need not worry excessively, because Hamilton will not let the team down. He has not been fazed by what he has achieved so far in his career, let alone in F1, where he has placed the superstars, including his team-mate, the double world champion Fernando Alonso, under intense pressure. The Lewis Hamilton story is much nearer the beginning than the end and the world is still waking up to just what is possible.
Is this what worries McLaren then, that they fear their new superstar might start to feel and act like one?
Perhaps Hamilton should answer that for himself. 'I've never read about something I've said, because I know what I've said,' he says before we part. 'My parents might say, "There's a good piece in the paper, do you want to read it?", but I won't read it. It's a good way of keeping your feet on the ground because when you read stuff like that you think, "Wow, it's great," and you feel yourself floating. As I don't read the stuff about me, I don't feel like a superstar. I don't understand people who do have that mentality, "I'm a superstar!" It's just a job. It's a fantastic job, and people just perceive you for some reason as a superstar, but at the end of the day I'm just Lewis. I've always been Lewis, and it's important to me to stay like that because people will take me like that.'
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