Lewis Hamilton wins historic SIXTH F1 world title after dramatic US Grand Prix to cement legacy as one of our greats
LEWIS HAMILTON burst into tears after a fitting masterclass to win his sixth Formula One world crown.
A controlled drive with flashes of pure brilliance to finish second finally sealed this championship that was realistically over some time ago.
Hamilton, 34, could have pootled around in eighth place to take the necessary points – but that’s not his style, as he controlled this pulsating race.
He celebrated by pulling donuts in his all-conquering Merc, but his driving style was anything as flamboyant, as he nursed his tyres to make just one pit-stop.
Hamilton said: “It’s overwhelming.
“It was such a tough race. Huge congratulations to Bottas. Today I just wanted to deliver the one-two for the team.”
And asked how many more titles he could lift the crown, Hamilton said: “I don’t know. I feel as fresh as I can be right now and just want to finish the season strongly.
He wasn’t really going to stuff this up though, was he?
He cut a relaxed figure as made his way to the grid using his push-scooter to breeze down the pitlane.
VETTEL WOE
He took long strides and wheeled his way past a tacky freshly-painted sign on the floor saying “reserved parking, 2019 world champion”.
Hamilton was on it from the start as he powered past Charles Leclerc and into the first corner.
Instead of running wide and steering clear of any potential danger, he was already in the thick of it.
He moved into third place with a stunning move on Sebastian Vettel, which will leave the German scratching his head as to how Hamilton made the move stick.
Up the inside and around the esses, Hamilton squeezed past Vettel and into third while a mistake from the German dropped him to sixth by the end of the first lap.
Worse was still to come for the Ferrari man as he was launched off a kerb and broke his rear suspension, forcing him to retire on lap eight.
It teed it up nicely as Hamilton squeezed up to the rear of Max Verstappen’s Red Bull.
The two clashed in Mexico, with Hamilton claiming that he feared getting “torpedoed” by the Dutchman.
Verstappen hit back saying Hamilton’s comments were “silly” and “disrespectful”, while he was also scathing about the world champion’s driving during qualifying.
However, we were denied the tasty prospect of another ding-dong battle when Red Bull called Verstappen in for fresh tyres on lap 14.
Mercedes then responded by pitting race-leader Bottas in to do the same a lap later, promoting Hamilton into the lead.
Out in front, he set about pumping in the lap times, despite his tyres deteriorating, running an extra 10 more laps than his opponents.
‘WORK WITH ME, MAN’
That has been one of Hamilton’s incredible strengths this season, his ability to preserve his rubber and give Mercedes the ability to offer him a one-stop strategy, whereas Bottas and Verstappen were on course to stop twice for tyres.
Any race wouldn’t be complete without some sort of blast from Hamilton to his race engineer, Pete Bonnington.
Over the team’s radio, hurried Hamilton said: “Give me a target, Bono. Work with me, man.”
Bonnington was absent from the last race as he underwent an operation, but he was back to assure his driver that he’d be fighting for the win as the two in front would need to stop again, whereas Hamilton could run to the end.
Bottas did indeed make his second stop and returned to the track 9.3 seconds behind Hamilton.
It left him with 20 laps to hunt down his teammate and regain the lead, but even a Bottas win and point for fastest lap would not have been enough to roll the championship over to Brazil.
As the laps counted down, finally the nerves began to fray for Hamilton, as he delivered a panicked couple of radio messages.
First he asked Bonnington: “I don’t know how long these tyres are going to last.”
And then added: “Has anyone lasted this long on these tyres?”
Whether they were genuine concerns about the condition of his hard tyres – strange given they were only 14 laps old and he did 24 laps on the softer, less durable medium tyres – he probably would not have expected Bonnington’s reply.
He told Hamilton: “We are concerned they might not make it to the end, we have provisions for another stop.”
However, Hamilton didn’t take the option and instead kept his head down as Bottas chipped away at his lead.
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And the Finn sized up his chance six laps from the end but Hamilton isn’t one to back out of a challenge and forced his teammate wide.
It was real heart-in-the-mouth stuff from Hamilton, when all he needed to do was play it safely.
Bottas did finally get past a lap later with the benefit of DRS but Hamilton did still hold off the fight from Verstappen to take second.