Lewis Hamilton: My Story by Lewis Hamilton

Author:Lewis Hamilton [Hamilton, Lewis]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Biography & Autobiography, Sports, Sports & Recreation, Motor Sports, Racing, F1
ISBN: 9780007281770
Google: TQDmAjO5hegC
Amazon: B0036FOH32
Publisher: HarperSport
Published: 2008-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

11

SILVERSTONE

‘It did take some getting used to – hanging out with P. Diddy, calling him Sean and having all these famous people’s numbers on my phone. I went to sit with Pharrell. I almost had to pinch myself! There I was, just a few days away from the biggest race of my life and at a private dinner with P. Diddy and Pharrell Williams. It was that kind of week.’

WHEN I CAME BACK TO EUROPE after those wonderful weeks in North America, my life was totally flipped upside down. I was on a completely different planet. All the attention was something really new to me. From being virtually unknown at the start of the year, I had become someone everyone recognized. People wanted to know all about me, not just my views on racing, but on girls, music, religion and anything else they thought about.

I knew I had been attracting a lot of attention in America, but when I was told that 20,000 people had turned up to see me drive at the pre-British Grand Prix test at Silverstone, it made me stop and think, ‘Wow!’ This was not for the British Grand Prix, not for the race, nor for qualifying and not even for practice. The Grand Prix was weeks away. I have never been the kind of person who expects a crowd to follow me around so I did not really believe they were there for me but everyone told me they were.

What a great feeling that was! Sadly I was not at the test and so could not fulfil the fans’ hopes of seeing me on the circuit. The big crowd for that test did make me stop and think just what was happening. I started to think, if it is this crazy now, then what about the actual British Grand Prix itself, my home race, a few weeks later at Silverstone?

Before tackling the British weekend, we had to go to France, to Magny-Cours where, after all the euphoria of Montreal and Indianapolis, it was a bit of a disappointment for me personally. I thought we were pretty steady in qualifying. I could have got pole again if I had not made a minor mistake on my final lap. But I was on the front row with Felipe Massa. Felipe is one of the drivers that I got on well with and I felt we had developed a decent level of trust. We all want to beat each other. As a rookie, I knew I had to earn the respect of the other drivers. Nothing comes easy in Formula One. In the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours, my start was poor and, to be honest, I really did not know why. All I saw was Kimi Räikkönen come flying past me in his Ferrari. He obviously got a good start. I do not like being overtaken, and it was the first time that it had happened on the track in Formula One. After that, I tried to stay as close to Kimi as possible.

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