Hamilton aims to ‘salute Senna’ with first Brazilian GP win

2015 Brazilian Grand Prix

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Lewis Hamilton said it would be a “salute” to his hero Ayrton Senna if he were able to score his first Brazilian Grand Prix victory this weekend.

Hamilton equalled Senna’s achievement of three world championship titles this year and surpassed his tally of 41 career wins, but has never won Senna’s home race in Brazil. He finished second year after spinning which vying with team mate Nico Rosberg for the victory.

“This was the home race for Ayrton, so it was a dream of mine to race in Sao Paulo when I was younger and I always feel his presence when I’m there,” said Hamilton. “He was such a huge hero in Brazil and it’s humbling that I always get such a warm response there.”

“It’s amazing to think that it took Ayrton eight attempts to win this race and it’s one of the few I haven’t yet won myself. If I can change that this weekend it would be a salute to him and another highlight to add to this amazing year, so I’ll be going all out to make that happen.”

“The Brazilian people are so passionate, fun and outgoing,” Hamilton added. “It’s a vibrant country, full of colour, and somewhere that’s quite special to me.”

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    Keith Collantine
    Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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    53 comments on “Hamilton aims to ‘salute Senna’ with first Brazilian GP win”

    1. How did drivers from the 60s and 70s even get out of bed in the morning when their was no Senna to be like?

      1. LOL, nice one @mickey18.

        I think I would rather see Massa win it if we want to celebrate someone brazillian.

        1. Haha yeah I know, hopefully a podium is on the cards for Massa.
          Watching a repeat of 2008, he was a beacon of dignity on that podium. Points for Fred Nasr too!

      2. @mickey18 I was going to make a joke but I can’t top that. Good one.

      3. @mickey18 Genuinely chuckling away at that :-)

        1. ColdFly F1 (@)
          9th November 2015, 12:54

          You have the power to reward it with COTD! @keithcollantine

          (and surely that’ll fill half of tomorrow’s comments – pro & con)

      4. Now this is truly funny well done matey!

        It’s as if he’s trying hard not to build a legacy of his own, but to just ride on the coat tail of Senna’s.

        1. It’s almost as if he knows people will be frothing at the mouth when he mentions Senna.

          I love it Lewis, keep it up :]

          1. Birds of the same feather flock together!

      5. :)
        Rockie it’s a very weird situation for Hamilton, he certainly does want to create his own brand, its one of the reasons he left Mclaren. He’s also been with a few mainstream entertainment agencies for management and stuck with #44 this season (instead of #1 for champion) to try and develop that as a number synonymous with himself.
        But then he goes and undoes all that by constantly insinuating himself as a simple Senna fanboy.
        Obviously its such big news at the moment because he’s currently at the level of success as Senna. But yes, strange and increasingly annoying.

        1. It’s weird isn’t it, I think he needs to go and see Serena’s gatorade video on youtube when she was asked as a child, who do you want to play like?
          Her reply was “I want people to play like Serena”.

          Thats how you become a great not by being a fanboy of a great.

          1. But wouldn’t you rather wait until people make such remarks about you rather than claiming it yourself. And he gets the Brazilian people on his side along the way. Well played PR I would say..

    2. I like Hamilton but I can’t stand all his Senna stuff. Half of my thinks a lot of it is the media’s fault though.

      1. Agreed, its ok to have and idol and so on, but to put “this for Senna, that for Senna, so humbling” everytime he says something public is alreay quite annoying.

    3. ColdFly F1 (@)
      9th November 2015, 11:38

      As F1 fan I stopped following Hamilton!
      I now simply google ‘Senna’ and find all there is to know about Lewis ;-)

    4. Yes (@come-on-kubica)
      9th November 2015, 12:00

      Please stop Lewis.

    5. Please… Please… Please… stop talking about Senna!!! Geez man… Every time you accomplish something the first thing that comes out of your mouth is Senna! It is getting irritating…

    6. God he’s like a minion, they say banana, he say senna, but atleast the minions sound cute when they say it.

    7. Oh just staaaph Lewis. Its as if he just wants to be hated.

      I think its the people around him who have got him thinking that he is just like Senna and that people love to compare him with Senna and that he is as good as Senna and that his humility makes audiences knees go weak or some thing like that. But actually it has become unbearably annoying and someone needs to tell him that.
      .
      .
      P.S: I can only imagine how Rosberg reacts each time he hears or sees his “I am the new Senna” statements and “Salute Senna” ramblings
      .
      Sorry if I appear too sour. I do respect him as a racer. Its just all this other ‘stuff’ he does.

      1. Dude has a hero. Big deal. Get over it already.

        1. Not very easy.
          Dude is a show off. ( wanted to use the term narcissistic but i didn’t ;) )
          I now actually don’t want him to win the Brazil GP.
          .
          .
          And now I hate myself.

    8. I don’t think defeating Rosberg will be good enough to salute Senna.

    9. Oh, Peh-lease… get over yourself Hamilton, you are an adult. these Senna comments are so annoying to listen to!! Senna would have punched Hamilton in the face the same way he did Eddie Irvine.

    10. A win by Massa in Brazil would be a much more touching “Salute” to Senna then Hamilton winning in Brazil. I can imagine Massa would cry, then speak fondly of his countryman. and the atmosphere in Brazil after such a fairytale win would be much more then any Hamilton win – and probably more then in any country. I much preferred the other yellow helmeted guy’s success in Brazil – that of Mark Webber.

    11. Anybody else irritated by the fact that Hamilton constantly refers to Senna as ‘Ayrton’, as if they were mates?

      1. Person calls another person by their given name.

        In equally shocking news, water is found to be wet.

      2. Nope..
        I rather called him with his given name..

      3. @celicadion23 There have been two Sennas in F1, was there ever another Ayrton?

        1. @jerseyf1 I don’t think he says Ayrton only so that people don’t confuse him comparing himself with Bruno Senna rather than Ayrton Senna.

    12. I was never a Senna fan. I used to attend Grands Prix during his time, but as a Mansell fan. Senna and Schumacher were more alike. They both had a bad streak, where they would break the rules in order to win races or get on pole. They both would take their opponents out of the race in order to win the race or the championship (not very sporting). Senna though was happy to race any team mate, just like Hamilton they both had/have an unmovable confidence that they are the best. Not so Schumacher, Alonso who must have a number 2. I don’t know about Vettel yet, I think he is probably one of the greats, but will drive with equal status in the team?

      1. I think Schumacher just made all his team mates look like number 2s :-)

        Ferrari had a policy of running a tail gunner to make sure Schumacher won, but most of that was at the time when there was much less of a competitive gap between teams than there is today. We even saw Webber getting used as a number 2 for Vettle on occasions at Red Bull who didn’t have a ‘number 1’ status to ensure they won the drivers championship. It would make no sense for Mercedes not to do the same. I think the only reasons they don’t just now is the luxury of the performance gap between them and the nearest competitor.

        1. Webber was never a number 2. In fact he did more to try and help Alonso win than he did to try and help the team win.

        2. Best Avatar ever.

      2. Senna though was happy to race any team mate

        Well Senna blocked Derek Warwick from being his teammate, apparently, because supposedly he was too fast (not that I agree necessarily). And we do know that Ayrton used to weight up Bruno’s kart to make sure his young nephew didn’t have an advantage!

        As personalities I didn’t like Senna, Schumi or Mansell. For some reason I do like Alonso and Hamilton. Vettel is a bit of a work in progress.

        I don’t have a problem with Lewis mentioning Senna from time to time, and since they’re in Brazil it was always inevitable right now. Perhaps it helps that I don’t idolise Senna, and also I kind of expect Hamilton to have some kind of touchstone like that because after all he’s religious and that’s how he is.

        I don’t mind Lewis being mega successful either, which is another thing that seems to wind some people up, like when he turned up somewhere in his LaFerrari last week and the site where I saw it had a long stream of catty comments about it.

    13. Of course LH has every right to idolize anybody he wants, but I do think it is going a bit far to claim to carry his baton as he claimed in recent weeks. A win in Brazil and a salute to Senna? Sure, why not.

      What I can’t stop thinking about though, is how much, imho, Senna would have hated the current iteration of F1, would have hated being forced to conserve in what is supposed to be a limit-pushing sprint.

      All I see here is a driver who is using the tact of self-promotion to somehow tie himself to Senna. I doubt DC would have written an article claiming LH is the Senna of the day, if LH himself hadn’t kept reminding us of a comparison strictly on idolization and numbers of Championships.

      Today’s cars and the current formula do not lend themselves to comparisons to the true Greats. DRS, tires meant to create the show, and extreme conservation, likely have Senna turning in his grave over how badly F1 has fallen from what it should be.

    14. Cannot help but feel he keeps going on like this under the instruction of his PR team and not a day seems to go buy without a Senna comment from Hamilton. His dad named him after Carl Lewis but never mentions him, time to go to deedpoll and become Senna Hamilton. He is exsurting a few worrying trates of a voyeur.

      1. Here’s another explanation: the media publishes all the Senna soundbites, but a mere few of the others, thereby creating a false image. Which is something the media does a lot.

        1. Or, Hamilton just wants to be like Senna and doesn’t miss an opportunity to mention him.

          1. Or, people are so desperate for an excuse to dislike the guy they’ll latch onto even the tiniest thing and blow it beyond all proportion.

            1. I think so. A very love him or hate him character. Maybe he is carrying the baton for Marmite.

    15. And here we go again.

      *Sigh*

    16. Do people speaking on Senna’s behalf saying Lewis is out of place feeling like he has the right to say he is carrying the baton for Senna see the irony?

      1. Depends on who the people speaking on Senna’s behalf are. There’s a big difference between armchair fans, for example, giving a relatively anonymous and harmless opinion on a forum, and LH asserting himself as worthy to carry Senna’s baton.

    17. Lewis will simply have answered a question that was asked by a journalist, and they always have their own agenda. However I do wish he would think how journalists can twist things to sell news. I know journos need soundbites, but does Lewis need to ‘bite’ each time? In some ways Hamilton is a bit like Senna; he likes to say things that people consider profound. I think he is probably genuine when he says them, but they can come out sounding a bit ‘icky’; Senna was just the same. In other ways Lewis is miles away from Ayrton; I feel Lewis is a much fairer racer and does not skirt too close to deliberately dubious tactics on track. Ayrton had a win at all costs mentality, by fair means or foul. Personally I would prefer Lewis to stay away from providing journalists with Senna soundbites and focus on what he is achieving for himself and building his own legend status.

      1. The problem with that is the modern media is a pack of vultures, always on the lookout for the next carrion they can pick clean. Compare to journalists of old, who, while not perfect, at least tried to be fair and balanced.

        1. Agree. Look at Sky post Mexico converage. I wanted technical info, discussion on drivers lines during the race e.t.c instead they rocked from trying one potential tabloid story to another, none of the drivers gave them anything but they really tried.

    18. As a Hamilton fan since 2007, I admit it’s getting harder and harder go keep supporting him. At some point soon I’ll have had enough.

      1. You’re not a Hamilton fan.

    19. Since his childhood days Ayrton senna was Lewis Hamilton’s hero.Lewis himself said many times that he is never equal to great senna.Lewis is already one of the greats in f1.He didn’t think he is senna but it is only respect and admiration towards his idol.Nothing wrong in it.Being a heart on sleeve attitude he said openly what he feels rest is media hype.

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