“I wasn’t convinced necessarily at the beginning”- Lewis Hamilton back when he was approached by Niki Lauda to join Mercedes.
Back in 2013 when Lewis Hamilton joined Mercedes, the whole f1 fraternity spoke against this move and termed it as the career suicide for the Briton driver.
Now, the 35-year-old F1 star has revealed that even he took time to buy the plan by Mercedes and initially was hesitance but the constant pursuance by the group made him believe in the project eventually.
“It wasn’t in Singapore that Niki ‘sold me a dream’,” Hamilton explained in today’s FIA press conference. “I had spoken to Niki, I was back home in Monaco, and I was talking to him and he was talking to me.”
“I’m pretty sure he was the first one I’d spoken to and he’s like ‘you’ve got to come to the team’. And I wasn’t convinced necessarily at the beginning.”
“I think the convincing stage, which really made me look into it more, was when Ross came around my mum’s house and sat in the kitchen and we had tea, and he showed me what the plan was for the team.”
“That was the real, in-depth insight into what the team was planning and the changes that they were trying to do. So that was really the ‘selling’ point.”
“With Niki we worked on the layout of the deal. Good memories. I think the important part of Singapore was that Niki and I, more so for him, Niki realised that we had a lot in common and I think that was the start of our friendship because I remember him saying to me, ‘you’re a lot like me’.”
“And I think he realised we had a lot more in common than he previously had thought since we hadn’t really spoken before so it was all done on assumption and what people write.”
Didn’t realise he will be so successful
Hamilton went onto register five championship titles with Mercedes and is on the verge of bagging another, which will take his total tally to seven, equaling Michael Schumacher’s record.
“I could only have dreamed – I say it time and time again – it was far beyond my wildest dreams thinking that anyone would get to seven. I dreamt of trying to do something that Ayrton had done.
“Getting one world championship was great and then it was very tough to get the second. And I spent years trying to help the team win another world championship.
“And then I had to make a big decision about whether I stay put and keep trundling along or go and do something more adventurous,” he said.
“Naturally, I knew I made a very good decision when I made the decision, I knew it was the right thing for me. But did I know we would win six world titles? No.
“I think what it says is that in life we’ve got to definitely make sure we take that leap of faith. Do what you think is right for you and not what people tell you to do. Do the homework so you have the pros and cons and then go with it, whether it’s good or bad.”
