You have to dig deep into the Formula 1 archives to find years when Lewis Hamilton won fewer than 10 grands prix. In 2013, his first year after switching from McLaren to Mercedes, he managed just a single victory. But even in 2021, the season when his championship streak came to a dramatic halt in the legendary Abu Dhabi finale, Hamilton still collected eight race wins.
Then came the new regulations for 2022. The ground effect cars and their notorious bouncing replaced the previous generation, and Hamilton's win rate suddenly collapsed: zero wins in 2022, zero again in 2023, and just two in 2024 – his farewell year at Mercedes.
Hamilton is now 40 and has fended off calls that he’s past his prime from all angles – with ex-racer Ralf Schumacher recently pointing to a kind of "stubbornness of age" as one of the reasons behind the seven-time champion’s barren run.
Is Hamilton really over the hill and will the younger generation simply take over? Much like Novak Djokovic, who has lately been forced to concede that new kids on the block Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz are simply better in the world of tennis.
Yet Hamilton’s fans worldwide, Ferrari management, and probably the seven-time world champion himself still cling to a lifeline. Perhaps Hamilton hasn’t forgotten how to drive a Formula 1 car, perhaps he just doesn’t get along with today’s ground effect machines as well as he did with the previous generations?
