It was the morning after the night before. Lewis Hamilton was crystal clear, having stayed clear of Cristal.
He prefers watermelon juice to champagne and his one indulgence as team Mercedes partied hard at the exclusive Amber Lounge was a cognac in a stemmed bowl. He took two sips, and put it down. He didn’t much care for the taste, anyway, and wanted to stay fresh.
As the newly crowned drivers’ champion - Britain’s first multiple winner since the days of Sir Jackie Stewart - this was his night. Yet, as he took his place among friends, family and colleagues, watching those he loved at their happiest, he wasn’t thinking mere shallow triumphalism.
Hamilton, an increasingly mature 29, was looking back as well as forward. To karts, and childhood Christmas presents, and the view across the road to the hostel in Stevenage. To his dad in the garage and Knorr’s chicken and noodle soup. The formative years, a biographer would call them; or the making of a champion.
Hamilton smiled, and drank it all in, minus the alcohol, of course. The following morning he would be early on parade for his team and sponsors, very much the bling millionaire. Diamond-encrusted gold chains, diamond-studded ear-rings and a monochrome ensemble faultlessly styled: black cap, white shirt, straight-legged black trousers, huge white boots.
Hamilton was the picture of successful affluence in a region famous for it. At the Westin Resort in Abu Dhabi, the council house kid fitted right in.
LOOKING BACK
“What did we do last night? We had a nice dinner and reminisced about all the different things we experienced over the years,” Hamilton said. “It was all there, the days spent in the back of a trailer, sitting by the gas heater with a flask of chicken noodle soup, shaking my dad’s hand just before going out there. All the stages we went through.
“It would be a real shame to forget those days. I remember them like yesterday. Being at my radio-controlled race track down a country lane. I remember what it looked like, how we would get there. I remember my first petrol car. This guy turned up down a back road in Stevenage and he wanted to flog his little petrol car.
“I was five. I didn’t know what money was. I probably had 5p to my name. My dad paid for it. I had only driven radio controlled until then. I remember getting that petrol car and driving it around and I was really quick. And then I blew the engine up. It was old. Yeah, that was the coolest day.
“There was a track, the Rye House Kart Circuit and you’ll get all sorts down there. I’d be in a little kart and a great big petrol thing would go past me - whoosh. It was terrifying. And your first instinct was to catch them up and overtake, but of course you couldn’t go that fast. But I tried.
“It’s all still there. I remember walking in and seeing my dad building my next radio-controlled car, every day after work. I cut my finger on a blade that he was using to shape the body. I remember the day he built the two sheds for our go-kart - I remember exactly what that looked like. And I remember the day I arrived at my dad’s from my mum’s at Christmas, looking through the letterbox because there was nobody in and saw the present on the table, my first go-kart, all wrapped.
“I left, but I knew I had it, and I didn’t want him to know because it was a surprise, so I virtually walked in backwards and went upstairs when he came home, so I didn’t see it and I could pretend.
“So many memories, man. I remember the red and white flask full of Knorr’s chicken and noodle soup - it’s the best. I still have it to this day.
“I could bore people with all the moments that were special to me - all the people that have helped, guided and supported me through this.
“My mum doesn’t miss a race. She’s never here, never in the limelight, but she’s the best.”
Hamilton has met Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin this year. He was asked for his favourite of the many text messages since Sunday’s triumph. To the chagrin of politicians and star stuffers everywhere he replied with two words. “My mum,” he said.
Warm and cuddly. That is how Mercedes want their boy to be seen. Describing him as cold and spiky in the build-up to this race earned wounded looks from Hamilton’s team entourage. Why can’t we see the real him?
MANY FACETS
Yet there are many facets to this man. Certainly, warm and cuddly does not get to turn one as Hamilton did on Sunday.
The 0.2 seconds between getting the go light and putting the car in motion saw him five lengths up coming out of the first bend, having started the race in place two. Hamilton described it as his perfect start, but it was also utterly ruthless, the work of a driver not just on the edge, but at the pinnacle of his powers.
That doesn’t mean he cannot go further, though. Improvement would be a bonus, but if he simply maintains the form of this season, Hamilton can continue to win. There is Sir Jackie Stewart’s British record of three world titles to attack, plus the need to see off his Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg for a second season. Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso may also be inspired by new cars next year, and Williams continue to improve.
THE HAMILTON ERA
Yet, despite these challenges, many see this as the dawning of the Hamilton era.
Why? Perhaps because he also seems inspired: by his own achievement. Hamilton is a different man these days, older and wiser, combining his daring brilliance as a driver with the smarter ability to do the mundane: to look after his tyres and coax his car home.
The first title, he says, he failed to take in. This one he intends turning to his advantage. The fear that his one championship as a very young driver could be as good as it gets has now faded. He knows this life has a second chapter and that this may only be the latest instalment. This time, he has the equipment to go on.
“It is going to be the greatest winter ever,” Hamilton predicted. “The last time I thought I was ready but I didn’t have a car. Now I’m in a great place.”
HIDING THE TEARS
Indeed he is. Hamilton was even in a good place on Sunday night when girlfriend Nicole was reduced to kissing his visor, as he hid tears of joy inside his racing helmet. Finally unveiling, Hamilton turned his back on the camera, endearingly self-conscious still. Sport is passionate, but motor-racing is high on testosterone. Hamilton didn’t want to look daft in front of lads like him, the fans in the Stevenage council houses.
“No man ever wants to be seen with tears in his eyes,” he said. “My emotions were all over the place. I had been running and jumping, and then I got upstairs and I was just overwhelmed. I really had to sit down and take the moment. I remember when I won it before, me and my dad sat down in a room and so much went on, I wish I had taken more in. That’s what I did: I took it all in. I didn’t want this to be one moment, one night. I wanted it to last.”
There was an embrace with team-mate Rosberg, and not an awkward one, either. It was heartfelt, genuine, just as Hamilton’s pity towards his rival wasn’t some act.
Rosberg had ended the race forlorn in 14th place, his car malfunctioning. From standing on the cusp of greatness, he wasn’t even on the podium.
ROSBERG EMPATHY
“I know how Nico would feel because I’ve been there,” Hamilton added. “I know how difficult it would have been to feel it fall away yesterday, to drive around with an underpowered car, being overtaken. That is one of the most painful experiences for a driver.”
The pair have had spectacular differences this year - most memorably in Spa - but Hamilton’s handling of it shows his growth.
The way he pulled back from the brink after their collision in that race shows his development. Then, as now, he drew from the past to illuminate the future.
“I remember sitting on my balcony in Monaco with the most incredible view of the sea, and I thought back to growing up in Stevenage, the view across the road to the hostel,” he said. “I thought about where I had come from, and where I wanted to go, the new approach and how we were going to attack it. Then I went for a long run and the following day it was clear. Then the results came.”
He makes it sound so simple. It isn’t. It never was. And to a kid from the Rye House Kart Circuit, it never will be.
Daily Mail