Hamilton’s Mercedes Era Ends in F1 Finale Amid Rising Tensions, Drama

While the Formula One drivers’ championship has been locked up, the constructors’ championship is still up for grabs between McLaren and Ferrari heading into the final race of the season in Abu Dhabi. However, with a 21-point gap between the two teams, perhaps the most dramatic finale Sunday will be Lewis Hamilton’s wildly successful run with Mercedes coming to an end.

Hamilton will wrap up a 12-year career with the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team, which started in 2013 after he replaced legendary driver Michael Schumacher. He led Mercedes to eight consecutive constructors’ titles from 2014 to 2021, the longest streak in history. 

He also won six of his seven drivers’ championships with the German automobile manufacturer, cementing Mercedes’s place at the top of F1 despite the team’s takeover of Brawn GP (formerly Tyrrell Racing and later Honda Racing) occurring in 2010. (Brawn did win both championships in 2009.) 

Mercedes’s success also helped them become one of F1’s premier engine suppliers. Mercedes supplied McLaren from the 1990s, before adding Brawn in 2009. The team currently supplies engines to three F1 teams besides itself: Aston Martin, McLaren, and Williams.

Hamilton will race for Ferrari in 2025 after he signed a multiyear deal in February—a move that triggered Ferrari’s shares to increase by about 12% in the U.S. stock market on the day of the announcement. Ferrari stock is up around 32% year-to-date.

The exact financial details of Hamilton’s new deal are unclear, though Italian site AutoRacer pegged his annual earnings at $100 million, including base salary, sponsorships, and other bonuses. According to Spotrac, Hamilton, who began his career with McLaren, has amassed $577.2 million in career earnings throughout his 18 years in F1—including close to $500 million during his time with Mercedes.

More Drama in Abu Dhabi

Hamilton’s teammate is suddenly involved in some drama with four-time champion Max Verstappen entering the final race.

Verstappen received a one-place grid penalty following qualifying at the Qatar Grand Prix on Saturday for driving “unnecessarily slow,” which impeded George Russell’s lap. The penalty resulted in the two drivers swapping places, though Verstappen would ultimately win the race while Russell would finish fourth.

Verstappen said after the ruling that he “lost all respect” for Russell, comments the British driver addressed to the media ahead of the Abu Dhabi race.

“I find it all quite ironic, seeing as Saturday night he said he was going to purposefully go out of his way to crash into me and ‘put me on my fucking head in the wall,’” Russell said. “So to question somebody’s integrity as a person while saying comments like that the day before, I find, is very ironic, and I’m not going to sit here and accept it.

Russell even cited past incidents to showcase Verstappen’s behavior—including his battle against Hamilton for the championship in 2021.

“Whenever anything is not going his way, he lashes out with unnecessary anger and borderline violence,” Russell said.