Lewis Hamilton backed up his pole run with a win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. His main competition was his teammate, Fernando Alonso. Alonso, a two time Formula One Champion, actually had a noticable bauble on the track that probably cost him the race.
Hamilton, a Formula One rookie, has already had a storybook Formula One career. He has never started a race farther back in the pack than sixth. He has never finished off the podium, and now, he has won twice, with the races running back to back weekends.
The win puts him 10 points ahead of Alonso in the Championship standings. A win is equal to ten points, thus Alonso needs to win a race, and to have Hamilton not finish in the points to tie.
The win adds to the tension on the team, as Alonso was McLaren's #1 driver, with Hamilton the team's #2. In Formula One, while all drivers are going for the win, the #1 driver is the presumed leader of the team and the driver the team thinks has the best chance of winning (and winning the Championship). Hamilton has rapidly turned that logic on its head.
In a USAToday article after last week's win, the reporter prodded Hamilton about a Nascar career. Hamilton didn't rule it out but pointed out that he had many goals to achieve in F-1 first. If Montoya brings Nascar the hispanic community, what would happen if another F-1 driver (possibly a Champion) hopped over to drive stock cars?
Personally, I don't think Hamilton will do it. He's British and has grown up with the ideal of a Formula One Championship as the penultimate goal. At retirement, even if that happens tomorrow, he'll probably go the way of Sir Jackie Stewart - to the broadcasting booth or Michael Schumacher - as an adviser/talent scout for his team.
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