Hamilton Discusses How His 'Worst Decision' Turned To 'Best Ever'

Sunday, 08 September 2024 at 18:00

Seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton talked about the defining moment of his F1 career when the "worst decision" turned into the "best ever."

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton is currently competing in his 18th season in Formula 1. During his whole career, the 39-year-old has competed only for two teams: McLaren and Mercedes.

The career-defining moment Hamilton discussed during his recent Performance People podcast appearances is also connected to these two teams.

After the 2012 season, Hamilton decided to leave McLaren, one of the best teams on the grid, which finished second, second, and third in the Constructors' Championship from 2010 to 2012.

The Briton decided to leave this highly successful F1 team to join Mercedes - a team that finished 4th, 4th, and 5th in the Championship 2010-2012. He said:

"Pretty much everyone told me to stay, but I went with my gut and my intuition and it was the best thing for me. I was with a championship-winning team. I was with McLaren, which had such a great history."

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"Obviously, Mercedes used to own half of McLaren, and so it was partly their team, but then they broke away and bought their own team, and as they were trying to ramp up, they weren't having a lot of success."

"I think they were the fifth or sixth-best team at the time, so they were often finishing out of the top 10, struggling to get into the top 10."

However, as we know, the seven-time World Champ could not have timed his decision better. He joined Mercedes for the 2013 season, in which the German team finished second, while McLaren only fifth.

From 2014, Mercedes went on to win every single Constructors' Championship until 2022. In the meantime, Lewis Hamilton's former team - McLaren, struggled and didn't manage to win a single race (until 2021).

"As a World Champion, people were like: 'This is the worst decision you can make, this not a great team and your career is over.'"

"All the pundits, all the media outlets, all the fans, everyone was like: 'Career's over.' And then it went well and everyone's like: 'Oh, it's the best decision ever made."

At the start of the 2024 season, Hamilton made another big decision in his career—to leave Mercedes and join Ferrari, which also didn't seem like a much better option at the time. Whether this decision was right remains to be seen.