“McLaren Champion of the Future”: 10-Year-Old Lewis Hamilton’s Bold Autograph From Life-Changing Awards Ceremony

Lewis Hamilton, arguably the best driver in F1 for the last few years and one of the very best in the sport without a doubt. A crown jewel for F1 and Mercedes alike, the man has racing stats that will make any driver jealous. However, it was not his current team Mercedes that he vouched for as a kid.

The Mercedes man has seven World titles to his name. He was six of them with the Silver Arrows. However, Hamilton, as a kid, wished success for McLaren, the team with which he picked up the lone title back in 2008. Strange, isn’t it?

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This came to light when Brad Philpot, two times Nurburgring Endurance Champion, shared a post on his Twitter account. The post had the 10-year-old Lewis Hamilton’s signature in it with “McLaren champion of the future” written on it. Hamilton, back then, was a cadet kart driver, and he signed the menu at the Autosport Awards.

“What do you think the earliest @LewisHamilton autograph you could buy would be? I ask, because I have one he signed from the night he asked Ron Dennis to drive for Mclaren. It’s from when he was a Cadet kart driver and it’s signed on a menu from the Autosport Awards.”, stated the tweet.

What made Lewis Hamilton choose McLaren over Mercedes?

Mercedes has been a reckoning force after the Hybrid era. The current team that competes was formed in 2010 after they took over the Brawn GP team and rebranded it. To put light on Lewis and his cadet days, it would probably be 1995-1996 when the Briton put his signature.

To go by the year 1995-1996, McLaren, Ferrari and Williams were the strong teams back then. The post-Ayrton Senna-Alain Prost era put the Woking-based team on top order. It’s needless to say that Hamilton himself debuted for the team he liked in 2007.

In his debut year, Hamilton finished as the runner-up to Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari. After spending six seasons and winning his maiden championship with McLaren, Lewis moved to Mercedes in 2013, where he reached new heights.

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