Hamilton doubts the value of his championship title
The British driver believes there are too many world champions in Formula One today for his 2008 title to still mean something and would like to have two or three more.
As the title seems increasingly likely to slip away from Lewis Hamilton this season, he is starting to find the time dragging on and doubts the value of his own hard-fought title won against Felipe Massa in 2008.
« The world championship is like a gold medal » says the Briton to the Daily Mirror. « It’s nice to have it but it doesn’t last very long, you move on to something else. I never think about my little world championship title. »
« In the past, there weren’t many who won the championship—it was the same guy who won them—but now, […] there are five drivers on the grid who have been champions. A different guy wins it each year, so it means less to me because other people have won it, but having two or three, that’s a nice feeling, it would mean something. »
Certainly, Lewis Hamilton is just one of the 32 world champions, and he would undoubtedly like to join the club of 14 drivers who have won multiple titles, but this figure must be considered against the approximately 900 drivers who have participated in the world championship to remind us that he is nonetheless part of one of the most exclusive clubs.
Moreover, if dominating Formula One is a strong sign of personal and collective achievement, isn’t winning even just one title but at the end of a season that opposed several champions just as rewarding? Isn’t this what leads many people, rightly or wrongly, to devalue Michael Schumacher’s titles simply because he lacked real rivals? Do others not attribute the status of a world champion to Stirling Moss, even though he never was, just because he had the misfortune of competing against the likes of Juan Manuel Fangio, Jack Brabham, Phil Hill, or Mike Hawthorne?
One thing is certain, however: Lewis Hamilton is committed to leaving his mark on the history of Formula One, just like his idol Ayrton Senna did, even as Sebastian Vettel is on track to double his own crown. Despite the difficulties and increasingly tough competition, the Briton remains as determined as ever to succeed, even though he seems to understand that the task will not be as easy as his early career suggested, forgetting that he is still only at the beginning of his career.
