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Formula 1 CEO Chase Carey and FIA president Jean Todt give their opinion on Lewis Hamilton and the young talent coming up in F1.
Lewis Hamilton has been a fixture of Formula 1 for more than 10 years. In that time he amassed 6 world championships and became the second most successful driver of all-time, behind only Michael Schumacher. That of course begs the question of how big of a gap he’ll leave in Formula 1 after he retires.
Two of the most powerful people in F1, Chase Carey and Jean Todt, were asked that question.
“First, I hope Lewis races forever! He’s obviously an incredible champion,” said F1 CEO Chase Carrey.
“His success speaks for itself and our sport’s built on heroes.
“He’s a hero second to none in our sport. Again, we hope he’ll race forever.
“He probably won’t! But I think he’s got some challenges still ahead of him and and we’d like to see him tackle those.”
Jean Todt added that young talent like Max Vestappen and Charles Leclerc are ready to step in to fill the gap left by Hamilton, once the 34-year-old retires.
“It’s fantastic to have a personality and a talent like Lewis,” Todt said.
“But it’s part of the history of motorsport, and every decade, you have some special talents.
“Before Lewis you had Michael [Schumacher], you started with [Juan Manuel] Fangio, [Jim] Clark, [Jackie] Stewart.
“There has always been some amazing talents and one day, Lewis will go and some new talents will have been confirmed.
“Verstappen, Leclerc, the newcomers – the car will help them but drivers like Norris, like Russell, and Gasly, they are very talented drivers. That will be the Lewis of the new generation.”
Chase Carey agrees.
“I can’t think of the year that has had a more exciting breadth and depth of young drivers coming into the sport,” continued Carey
“We’ve got an incredible, exciting future to those drivers. I hope they get a chance to the battle with Lewis.”
Source: motorsport.com
