A true champion, 10 years at the top of his game and undefeated in his sport for 17 years. :cheer: :cheer:

How shocked did Hamilton look? :lol:

Great to see a WINNER like Calzaghe get the award as opposed to a LOSER like Hamilton

 

I was ":rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:" when Hamilton saw he was 2nd

 

 

 

 

good, i watched top gear instead.

 

glad that little dick got beat :D

Indeed, I expected the boxers to split the vote and end up not winning anything - then they got 1st and 3rd. There were some absolutely ridiculous nominations for the top 10 this year and Hamilton certainly didn't deserve to win anything - motor racing drivers being among the most boring people on the planet. Personality? Yeah, right.

IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THAT PAULA RADCLIFF CHICK TING

 

I mean she has just had a baby

I hate Boxing - grown men acting like thugs trying to beat each other to a pulp. :puke2:

 

My Top 3 were:

 

1. Lewis Hamilton

2. Paula Radcliffe

3. James Toseland

Edited December 10, 200717 yr by Euro Music

What did Hamilton do to deserve the award ?

 

He drove the best car in the field to 4 wins, had lots of FIA assistance, beat a man that was being f***ed about by his team and choked Henman style in the last 2 races

I'd actually have given it to James Toseland for his piano playing - by far the most entertaining thing of the night.

What did Hamilton do to deserve the award ?

 

He drove the best car in the field to 4 wins, had lots of FIA assistance, beat a man that was being f***ed about by his team and choked Henman style in the last 2 races

 

You forgot that they had details of Ferrari's car designs as well. (PS - In the second-last race, they put the wrong tyres on for a rainy track.)

Edited December 10, 200717 yr by DitzyNizzy

What did Hamilton do to deserve the award ?

 

He had 4 wins, broke 2 - 57 year old records, ended up 2nd in the championship - all in his rookie year.

 

Neither Schumacher, Senna or Prost didn't manage that.

 

What cry baby Alonso couldn't stand is that Lewis is every bit as good as he is.

 

He had 4 wins, broke 2 - 57 year old records, ended up 2nd in the championship - all in his rookie year.

 

Neither Schumacher, Senna or Prost didn't manage that.

 

What cry baby Alonso couldn't stand is that Lewis is every bit as good as he is.

 

Sorry but you are showing a lack of understanding of the way F1 works if you are trying to make comparisons with previous generations

 

1) Cars are much more reliable now than in previous eras, retirements among the big teams are a rarity these days because of the engine rules and turning down of revs and so on whereas the likes of Senna, Prost and so on would retire several times a season with mechanical failures

 

2) Driver aids - the cars that Hammy drive virtually run on rails with all these electronic aids and driver devices and traction control and so on not to mention massive run off areas now where previous years would have resulted in a trip into the wall

 

So the fact that cars are so much more reliable than in the Senna and Prost era, the fact that massive run offs exist, the fact that cars are filled with technology and driver aids to keep the car on the road totally destroys any of Hamilton's achievements if you want to make a direct comparison with Senna and Prost, yes Hamilton broke some records but most of that was due to the electronic aids and the reliability of the cars due to rev limiters and 2 race engines

Sorry but you are showing a lack of understanding of the way F1 works if you are trying to make comparisons with previous generations

 

1) Cars are much more reliable now than in previous eras, retirements among the big teams are a rarity these days because of the engine rules and turning down of revs and so on whereas the likes of Senna, Prost and so on would retire several times a season with mechanical failures

 

2) Driver aids - the cars that Hammy drive virtually run on rails with all these electronic aids and driver devices and traction control and so on not to mention massive run off areas now where previous years would have resulted in a trip into the wall

 

So the fact that cars are so much more reliable than in the Senna and Prost era, the fact that massive run offs exist, the fact that cars are filled with technology and driver aids to keep the car on the road totally destroys any of Hamilton's achievements if you want to make a direct comparison with Senna and Prost, yes Hamilton broke some records but most of that was due to the electronic aids and the reliability of the cars due to rev limiters and 2 race engines

 

Fernando Alonso was supposed to be the greatest driver on the paddock, replacing the aging Michael Schumacher. Yet this rookie became the first driver in over 20 years to outperform a then World Champion Team mate (when Ayrton Senna outperformed Alain Prost), and the first rookie driver ever to outperform a World Champion team mate in his debut season and the second rookie driver ever to win more than one race in a season.

 

Hamilton has matched or set the following records in Formula One:

 

Most consecutive podiums from debut race: 9 (previous record was 2)

Most consecutive podiums for a British driver: 9 (tied with Jim Clark)

Youngest driver to lead the World Championship.

Most wins in a debut season: 4 (equalling Jacques Villeneuve's record from 1996)

Most pole positions in a debut season: 6

Hamilton is the first driver of black heritage to compete in Formula One and the first driver of black descent to win a major race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in any discipline. In addition, he is the third youngest driver to achieve an F1 pole position, and the fourteenth F1 driver to achieve a podium finish on his debut.

 

Yes, because of the way the cars were set up there was only ever likely to be four winners (Raikkonen, Hamilton, Alonso or Massa) of any one race. But to belittle his achievement in his debut season puts you on a par with "Mad" Max "Mussolini" Moseley.

 

As for not having driving ability, then how come prior to driving for McLaren F1 this season, his record in all forms of driving is similar to a hot knife going through butter after winning the British Formula Renault, European Formula Three and GP2 Championships, and before that he was a phenomenal cart racer.

 

To diss his talent is laughable when you consider his performance on Top Gear's legendary "Star in a reasonably prized car" section driving a Suzuki Aerio Liana where in wet conditions he beat the previous wet record by 2.4 seconds set by Mark Webber and set the third fastest time ever, beating the likes of Damon Hill in the dry, equalling Jenson Button in the dry & was just 0.1 second behind Nigel Mansell.

 

As for the great Fernando Alonso isn't it great that he has insisted at #1 status back at Renault in 2008 forcing the quite brilliant Heikki Kovalainen to be rewarded for a superb last season's efforts with his P45 because Alonso is clearly a coward when it comes to having team-mates who might actually be better than him. But hey you wont diss Fernando because he has a clause in his new contract allowing him to move to the Scuderio in 2009 if the prancing horse comes a calling. :rolleyes:

 

As for the BBC Sports Personality of The Year, when Lewis Hamilton was on Sky Sports' Soccer AM a few weeks ago, he expressed amazement that he was so heavily fancied by the bookies (although blowing a World F1 Championship in the last race of the season never stopped Damon Hill or Nigel Mansell winning the same award), stating that he thought either Joe Calzaghe, James Toseland or Ricky Hatton (if he won in December which he sadly did not) deserved the accolade as they actually achieved the pinnacle of their sport.

 

So your clear hatred towards a talented sports personality puts you on a par with the average right wing Daily Mail reader who thinks Adolf Hitler had a few good ideas regarding immigrants & people of certain skin colours. ;)

 

No doubt you played over & over the Spanish national TV F1 commentary that had been watched over 5 million times on Youtube (thankfully this racist commentary has now been removed) when Hamilton had mechanical problems with his car in the Final race of the season that lost him 40 seconds on lap 9 costing him a near certain 4th place that would have won him the world title enjoying the clear monkey noises made by the mature Spanish commentary team that made the British ITV jingoistic commentary an example of stiff upper lip unbiasedness in comparison.

 

This time last year I put £5 at odds of 66/1 on him winning Sports Personality of the Year, but I covered that by betting £10 at 5/1 on Calzaghe the week before the event so I won anyway. However for Sports Personality of The Year 2008 Lewis is 3/1 favourite to win, but with Mad Max and the maFIA to contend with I wont be wasting a penny.

 

Still good to see the International Autosport magazine members & writers stick a clear two fingers up at the Ferrari International Assistance and award Hamilton the driver of the season award & the McLaren MP4-22 the car of the year award.

 

I'll be praying that in 2008 Max Moseley loses his high court libel case against the Times & the Independent regarding allegations made on the lack of impartiality he has in favour of a certain Italian racing team that likes the colour red (such a pity Channel 4 Dispatches bottled a documentary making the same allegations) and hopefully be forced out of his job, as F1 is all the poorer with this offspring of one of the most appalling facist right-wing biggots of British history who still supported slavery into the 1950s.

I have never disputed the fact that Hamilton has driving ability, he is a good to very good driver but the way the media build him up to be the greatest driver of all time is nauseating, there is patriotism and there is the near Diana style obsession, the Hamilton love in by the Brit press goes beyond patriotism and nationalism into almost Diana style hero worship, I don't dispute the fact that he is a very good driver but I do dispute the media's belief that he is the best driver there has ever been

 

There are several things though that do reduce his achievements somewhat :

 

You say that he won the Formula Renault, Euro Series and GP2, indeed he did but in each of those cases Ron Dennis paid for a drive in the very best team, the teams he won those titles in were all the absolute very top team paid for by Ronzo, Hamilton has had a silver spoon career where he has never had to struggle to get the top rides because Ron Dennis has footed the bill so all we know about him is that he can drive the very best cars well, not even Senna had that sort of beginning (rear of the grid Toleman then a mid to upper grid Lotus) Schumacher (Jordan then a somewhat down on its luck Benetton), both did incredibly well in poor to average equipment whereas Hamilton has never had to do that he has always had the very top rides

 

Even McLaren this year he had the very best car so while he had a very good season the drivers that stood out for me more than Hamilton were 1) Nico Rosberg, totally murdered his experienced team mate and put the Williams into outrageously high places on the grid, while everyone has their little Hamilton love in everyone forgets the true driver of the season Nico Rosberg 2) Sebastian Vettel - a 19 year old kid who lost half a finger barely a year ago in an accident putting a joke car Toro Rosso into incredible positions in races towards the end of the season 3) Heikki Kovalainen - again a rookie and the driver who finished the most races in the season (all bar 1) and destroyed the highly experienced race winner Fisichella but hey because Hamilton drove the best car around the track for a season and picked up points the drivers I listed who did incredible things with poor equipment get forgotten about. Kovalainen is managed by Flavio Briatore who is Renault team boss and is the hot favourite for the 2nd McLaren drive so I doubt Flav would sack one of his own, more likely Kovalainen is a shoe in for the 2nd McLaren seat so wasn't available to Briatore

 

Hamilton pre F1 season had unprecedented amounts of testing, 132,000 kms in the new car compared with 48,000 for Alonso, so when Hamilton made his debut he had 84,000km more experience of driving a McLaren than Hamilton and that no matter what experience Alonso had is very very important given that Alonso had only driven Michelin's before

 

I will not judge Hamilton properly until he has driven a season in an absolute dog of a McLaren, if he gets a dog of a McLaren into positions that it don't belong then I will give him huge amounts of credit....until then

Edited December 13, 200717 yr by Vic Vega

Craig, you do have a point. But really, it isn't Hamilton's faul that he had the best car. If Ron Dennis spotted his talent from an early age then he was hardly going to reject it and try and go it alone. In the same way that Chelsea and Manchester United always try and find the best youngsters from around the world Ron Dennis wanted someone for the future. It was his large amount of talant that got recognised though, I'm sure there was no one stopping anyone doing the same to Nico or Kovy was there.