Sebastian Vettel or Lewis Hamilton – Who is a legend in the making?

Lewis Hamilton : Playing second fiddle

Michael Schumacher with Lewis Hamilton

Once touted to be the next Schumacher, Lewis Hamilton hasn’t really been on-course to achieve the success tasted by the legendary German driver. And the tag which Hamilton got, was before Sebastian Vettel arrived on the F1 seen.

Lewis Hamilton is undoubtedly a great driver based on his skills and attitude. But his ability to win races has been considerably lower as compared to that of Schumacher or Vettel.

Could Hamilton’s considerable dip in performance be attributed to the car that he drove? Well, that may be the case. During his stay with McLaren-Mercedes, the British driver managed to win the World Championship once. But that was in 2008.

The performances in the seasons that followed weren’t really encouraging for Hamilton. While he did manage to get on the pole, he wasn’t able to convert them into race wins. That he wasn’t able to finish among the top three in the drivers’ table during the last four years was utterly disappointing.

On the other hand, Vettel managed to win races and Championships in his fast-paced Red-Bull.

Among other reasons, Hamilton finally made the switch to Mercedes at the end of the season last year. While this year too hasn’t been a good one for Lewis, with just a single race win in Hungary, he has still managed to be in the hunt for the Championship and is currently third.

But Hamilton has an opportunity to turn things around in a new team with all his experience, like Vettel and Schumacher had done. He has Mercedes Team principal (Ex-Ferrari Technical Director) Ross Brawn as his Godfather, one of the men who are equated with Schumacher and Ferrari’s success.

Come to think of it, the Hamilton and Vettel duel reminds me of the tortoise and the hare story that I read as a kid.

While Vettel has to be the hare and Hamilton the tortoise, it remains to be seen whether the story has a similar outcome of the tortoise reaching the records first or will the hare have all the glory.

We have a lot of time on our hands before we find out.

Till then keep calm and enjoy Formula One!