INDIANAPOLIS — As rookie Lewis Hamilton continues to astonish Formula One -- and make sistashs in the states swoon -- even hardened veterans of the international auto-racing series are becoming increasingly awestruck.
UPDATE: Today the 22-year-old Englishman just won the U.S. Grand Prix, the second straight victory for the first black driver in F1's 61-year history.
Frank Williams, whose Williams team has been in the sport for more than 30 years, was asked this week to name a driver who reminded him of Hamilton. "Nobody," he said.
And former F1 driver David Hobbs, now a television analyst, recently called Hamilton's performance so good it was "unnerving."
Hamilton is repeatedly compared to golf's Tiger Woods, both for his exceptional abilities and his race, with the potential for expanding the diversity of the sport and its fans.First time father-to-be Woods, trying to win his third U.S. Open this weekend in Oakmont, Pa., told a British newspaper that he's "been impressed by the way [Hamilton] has handled himself off the race track. He has the potential to be a terrific role model."
After qualifying Saturday, Hamilton said "it's obviously nice to be compared to Tiger Woods." But he was cautious about his influence. "Whether or not it can have a similar impact on the [Formula One] audience in America?
I'm not sure," he said. "It will be good for the sport if it can."Hamilton, whose father Anthony was the son of emigrants to England from the Caribbean island of Grenada, was born in 1985 and named after U.S. track and field star Carl Lewis.
UK Express