How is Lewis Hamilton as a Teammate? Jenson Button Reveals

In his book, Life to the Limit. 2009 world champion Jenson Button opened up on a number of subjects in his life and F1 career. One of the aspects he covered was his relationship with compatriot, Lewis Hamilton when they were teammates at McLaren. According to Button’s testimony, Hamilton was “a bit weird” during their tenure together at McLaren.

The former F1 driver confessed that Lewis Hamilton was “a brilliant, mercurial driver”, but he tended to be “unpredictable” and the two were not exactly the best of friends. In spite of that, the 39-year old is glad that Lewis Hamilton for maturing and becoming a “great representative of the sport.”

A difficult relationship between Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button

It is noteworthy that Button dubbed Lewis Hamilton as “one of the greats” and is “the guy who really has that ‘gift’.” The bad news was that their partnership was mired by intra-team tension during their three years as McLaren team-mates.

He revealed that many advised against joining McLaren owing to Hamilton’s talent and that he may receive preferential treatment. However, Button thought that his arrival at McLaren changed the atmosphere within the team and Hamilton felt threatened by it.

Diving deeper into their relationship in their first season together, Button observed that Hamilton had no quarrel with him, though some feathers were ruffled. Truthfully, Button’s main concern was that the “atmosphere might be a bit lacking” .

He added in his book, “As people, we had a lot in common. There was our shared karting history, not to mention the fact that his dad was a customer of my dad. And, unlike a lot of drivers in Formula 1, neither of us came from an especially wealthy background; we’d achieved what we had through talent and a lot of grafting.”