Lewis Hamilton claimed his fifth drivers’ world championship on Sunday to draw level with Juan Manuel Fangio in the Formula One record books when he finished fourth behind a victorious Max Verstappen in the Mexican Grand Prix.
Hamilton’s success – the third time he has taken the title without finishing on the race podium – elevated him to a supreme club alongside Fangio with only seven-time champion Michael Schumacher ahead of him.
He was adding the 2018 crown to his championship wins in 2008, 2014, 2015 and 2017.
The 33-year-old Briton’s only remaining championship rival Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari, who needed a victory, with Hamilton outside the top seven, to keep his hopes alive, finished second.
He celebrated by executing ‘doughnut’ wheel spins for the cheering crowd before leaping out of his car and into the arms of his team.
After being congratulated by Vettel, Hamilton said: “It’s a very strange feeling right now.”
After surviving what turned into a battle of attrition at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez he added: “It was a horrible race… I really don’t know what happened.
“We were struggling both Valtteri (Bottas) and I and we had to just hang on and bring the car home.
