What Can Prevent Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes Failing in 2022?
Formula 1, courtesy of a titanic season-long battle between Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton allied to the smash-hit Netflix TV series Drive To Survive, is enjoying an unprecedented rise in popularity.
Lewis Hamilton congratulates the newly appointed World Drivers’ Champion, Max Verstappen. ©GettyImages
Nielsen Sports – the leading source of sports measurement and analytics around the world – has announced that one billion people will claim an interest in Formula 1 by April 2022.
Where there are millions of interested sports fans, there are usually bookmakers. Unsurprisingly online sportsbooks are reporting rapidly growing turnover on the premier motorsport. In turn, they are offering more betting markets than ever.
Is Hamilton Value at Even-Money to Be the 2022 Champion?
Even before Max Verstappen had set a foot on the top podium step of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, the betting market on the 2022 Drivers’ Championship had opened for business.
Now, after the smoke and acrid smell of punished tire rubber has cleared, the odds compilers make Lewis Hamilton the even-money favorite to regain his title.
Are his chances of taking an eighth World Drivers’ Championship title really even money? With his head bowed low – not for the knighthood Lewis Hamilton received three days after losing his crown – there are enough reasons to believe they should be considerably greater.
The Retirement Theory
In the early part of a Mercedes press conference, staged four days after Hamilton’s team had seen their driver lose the Championship, team boss Toto Wolff stated: “I would very much hope that Lewis continues racing because he is the greatest driver of all time… I think as a racer his heart will say he needs to continue.”
It was a strange statement given it was not made in response to a direct question about his star driver’s future. “Lewis and I are disillusioned at the moment,” Wolff continued. “Not disillusioned of the sport, we love this sport with every bone in our body, and we love it because the stopwatch never lies.”
With 2022 pre-season testing starting at the end of February, the pair have two months to regroup. Hamilton is under contract until the end of 2023, but he will definitely have a get-out clause allowing him to leave the team earlier and during the off-season.
But is retirement really on the cards?
Moving the Goalposts
If Hamilton does come to terms with what Mercedes views as an unfair 2021 Championship result what other reasons would lead him to walk away from the sport and his £80 million contract? Surely there are only two: injury and an uncompetitive car.
Given Mercedes has won the last eight Constructor’s Championships, the uninitiated would not consider it possible for the German manufacturer to suddenly produce a slow uncompetitive car.
Formula 1 have provided this impression of how the 2022 race cars will look. ©F1
However, the 2022 Formula 1 season heralds a new era for the sport. A raft of regulation changes means next year’s cars will barely resemble what we have become used to. They will be very streamlined.
Over-wheel winglets, 18-inch wheels with low-profile tires, larger simplified front wings attached to longer noses, rolled tips on the rear wings, more robust chassis and a new sustainable fuel using 10 percent ethanol are the new features.
Formula 1’s hierarchy says the changes “have been introduced to allow for closer racing with the potential for more overtaking.” By definition, ‘closer racing’ means any team’s advantage will be lessened.
Rewriting the Rulebook
The history books show regulation changes have regularly brought a new team to dominance. In 2014 the switch to hybrid-powered cars put Mercedes in control.
Red Bull ruled the roost beforehand. They were Constructors Champions between 2010 and 2013 inclusive when cars were powered by 2.4-liter V8 engines.
Ferrari had a similar run between 2000 and 2004. At this time cars used 3.0-liter V10 power units. However, the new 2022 rulebook does not feature any changes to the mechanics of next season’s car. And so, a changing of the guard is by no means guaranteed.
Illness or Injury?
Should he not retire or decide his car is uncompetitive during pre-season testing, all that is left to disappoint Lewis Hamilton fans is illness or injury.
During the 2020 season, Lewis Hamilton missed the Bahrain Grand Prix following a positive test for Covid-19. At this point of the year, he already had the Drivers’ Championship in the bag.
In 2021, if he had been forced to skip just one contest, Hamilton may well have headed to the final race of the season with the Championship already lost.
Tough Break
From an injury perspective, it is unlikely but not unusual for a driver to miss races through an ailment.
Michael Schumacher broke his leg in an accident at the 1999 British Grand Prix. He missed the next six races while recovering and the incident probably cost him a third World Drivers’ Championship.
Less severe, but always capable of keeping a driver out of his seat for a race weekend, is back pain. Kimi Raikkonen and Valtteri Bottas are amongst those that have been forced to sit out a race after picking up a back injury while not crashing during a practice or race qualifying session.
Have Ferrari Played a Cunning Game?
There are enough imponderables at play to discourage Formula 1 bettors from supporting Lewis Hamilton at even-money in the 2022 title race. The price simply represents poor value.
So where is the value? Many experts believe Ferrari sat back during the 2021 season watching Red Bull and Mercedes put the bulk of their time and resources into the Drivers’ Championship battle.
Concurrently the Italian team was developing and testing their technologies for a 2022 car capable of giving them their first World Champion since Kimi Raikkonen scored in 2007.
It is a sound theory, and with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz priced at 16/1 and 25/1 respectively in the 2022 World Drivers’ Championship betting markets found at the best betting sites, one of these Ferrari drivers could handsomely reward their supporters.
