Lewis Hamilton’s technical director was on way to design $117 million fighter jets before he was persuaded to join F1

Lewis Hamilton’s technical director Mike Elliot was off to set to make fighter jets before F1 became his heart’s calling and is now with Mercedes.

Mike Elliot has been with Mercedes for over 10 years and has played a pivotal role in their success during the current turbo-hybrid era. Before this season, he got promoted to the technical director role after James Allison was promoted as CTO of Mercedes’ F1 team.

However, Elliot’s legacy probably got a minor dent as his first car as a technical director was W13. Despite its radical concept and design, he admits that the fundamental issues with the car have hampered its vision.

Nevertheless, he has been a crucial part of Mercedes’ glory. But it wouldn’t have been possible if he hadn’t changed his mind early in his life. He initially aimed to develop fighter aircraft, as his father was from Royal Air Force, which piqued his interest in Aeronautical Engineering.

Britain has a state of the art technology when it comes to making fighter jets. Their latest release was the Eurofighter Typhoon, also developed by Germany, Italy and Spain.

According to Eurasian Times, per unit of Eurofighter Typhoon costs $117 million. An industry in which Elliot might have generated a fortune too. But his fate had other plans.

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How Mike Elliot’s friend and colleague convinced him to join F1

While Elliot was doing his PhD in Aerodynamics, he didn’t have his calling in developing aircraft. At that time, his PhD batchmate John Owen, with whom Elliot also shared an office, got his attention into F1. Owen is now the chief designer at Mercedes.

“We were in university together,” said Eliot in Beyond the Grid. “So, we were PhD students together, and we shared an office. At that time, Imperial college was known for bringing people in Formula 1.”

“Sharing an office with someone who wanted to do F1 got me interested. I watched a few races, but it wasn’t something I had a huge interest in before. So it was a combination of sharing an office.”

Lewis Hamilton: Mike Elliot saw what was coming at Mercedes

Before joining Mercedes, Elliot used to work for McLaren. At that time, also he worked with Hamilton. He claims in the above mentioned podcast that the Briton has been the only driver after testing who came and asked where he could improve.

Since then, the veteran F1 engineer had a mighty impression of Hamilton, which only increased when the 37-year-old won his first championship.

So, when Hamilton was about to join Mercedes in 2013, Elliot knew if he were given a car which could contest for the championship, he would bring in titles. Indeed that’s what Hamilton did in the following years.

Also read: When Lewis Hamilton preferred his $1.1 Million Ferrari supercar over Mercedes