[Foghorn Leghorn]

Prost has always rated Hamilton. He tipped him to beat Alonso in 2007, I remember thinking he was utterly bonkers, but nope, Prost is normally spot on with his assessments because the guy knows what he is talking about, they didn't call him the Professor for no reason.

Lets hope he can turn that big brain into winning ways at Renault, haha, but that's for another thread

[forzaferrari]

Prost has always rated Hamilton. He tipped him to beat Alonso in 2007, I remember thinking he was utterly bonkers, but nope, Prost is normally spot on with his assessments because the guy knows what he is talking about, they didn't call him the Professor for no reason.

Yup, I remember Schumacher back in 2001 (ish) saying Hamilton was going to be the next big name in f1, then a few years later something along the lines of "he will be a multiple world champ"

[Jody Barton]

Forza yup. He was winning super karts at the time and he was 3 years younger than everyone else... the other drivers to do that? Schumacher and Verstappen.

[PapaofGags]

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/140820...schumacher

Hamilton changed Formula 1 reference like Senna and Schumacher.

Lewis Hamilton reached a "surreal level" in 2018 that was similar to how Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna changed the "reference" for Formula 1 drivers, says Ross Brawn.

Hamilton wrapped up a fifth world title this year with a season that featured a joint-personal best tally of 11 wins from 21 races, despite increased opposition from Ferrari and, late on, Red Bull.

F1 managing director of motorsport Brawn highlighted Hamilton's "quite exceptional" pole lap in Singapore, where Mercedes was expected to be third-best before Hamilton topped qualifying and won, as an example of the British driver raising the bar in 2018.

"Sometimes you get a driver who finds the performance you just don't expect," Brawn told Autosport/Motorsport.com. "There are a couple of occasions, particularly in qualifying, when Lewis did that.

"He just took people's breath away. Those are the things you look at, and you just don't know where the performance comes from.

"Everyone thinks they know what the reference is and suddenly the driver does something that changes the reference.

"I was fortunate to see that sometimes in Michael Schumacher. We saw it with drivers like [Ayrton] Senna. And I think we saw that on a couple of occasions with Lewis this year.

"Those are the things you remember because as an engineer, you almost can't work out where it's come from.

[Jody Barton]

Yeah, I personally think the level Hamilton drove at in 2018, that no one was going to beat him. He was exceptional. Brawn is right to say he was at a level only a few drivers have reached in F1. The question is whether there is more to come from him, can he get better still? Can he even maintain the outstanding level he achieved in 2018 for 2019? It's not easy for athletes to maintain these sorts of level consistently, I think he'll dip somewhat in 2019, but he and Mercedes might still have more than enough.