Lewis Hamilton enters another chapter in his F1 career in 2025 as he moves to Ferrari after spending the last 12 seasons with Mercedes. The Briton is the most successful driver in F1 history with 105 wins in 356 races and seven world championship wins.
Lewis Hamilton: One of the Greatest Ever to Race in Formula 1
Hamilton has earned 104 pole positions, 202 podium finishes and 4862.5 points, claiming six world titles with Mercedes after earning his first championship for McLaren in 2008.
Lewis Hamilton: Early Potential
Hamilton started kart racing at the age of eight and won the British cadet class at age 10. He joined McLaren’s driver development programme in 1998 and won the karting European Championship and World Cup two years later.
He began racing single-seater cars in the British Formula Renault series in 2001 and by 2005, he was the Formula 3 Euroseries champion. He won the GP2 title (the forerunner of the current Formula 2 series) in 2006, earning an F1 seat at McLaren for the 2007 season at the age of just 22.
Lewis Hamilton: World Champion
Hamilton burst onto the F1 scene in sensational style, going close to winning the title in his first season. Partnering with former world champion Fernando Alonso, he finished third in his debut race in Australia and claimed podium finishes in the first nine races of his career. His first F1 win came in the 2007 Canadian Grand Prix and he won four times in all, as he and Alonso both finished one point behind Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari.
Hamilton won his first world championship amid dramatic scenes at the 2008 Brazilian Grand Prix, when he overtook Timo Glock of Toyota on the final lap of a wet race to pip home hope Felipe Massa to the title by one point. He finished fourth or fifth in the next four seasons with McLaren, but his decision to move to Mercedes, then a midfield team with no record of success, for the 2013 season stunned racing fans.
Lewis Hamilton: Mercedes Domination
After winning the 2013 Hungarian Grand Prix in his first season with the German team, Hamilton won the next two championships as they became the dominant force in the sport.
His success was interrupted when his teammate Nico Rosberg beat him by five points in the 2016 season, failing to score points in only one race while the Briton had two blank weekends. Hamilton racked up four more championship wins with Mercedes in consecutive years, giving him six titles in seven incredible seasons with the Silver Arrows.
Lewis Hamilton: Frustrations and Ferrari
Hamilton’s golden run of title success ended in the notorious finale to the 2021 F1 season in Abu Dhabi. The Briton was set to clinch his eighth championship when an unprecedented stewarding decision enabled rival Max Verstappen to snatch victory and claim his first title.
Mercedes were in decline over Hamilton’s last three seasons with the team as he finished sixth, third and seventh in the championship, and while he managed to win the British and Belgian races in 2024, he finished behind teammate George Russell for the second time in their three seasons together. After turning 40, Hamilton now hopes to benefit from a change of scenery alongside Charles Leclerc at Ferrari, and it will be interesting to see how his pace compares to that of the eight-time race winner who was runner-up in the 2022 world championship.
By Tom Hill
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