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Revealed: How Hamilton's F1 promotion shocked McLaren team

A new book released this week offers insight into the surprise within McLaren when members of the team learned that Lewis Hamilton was being promoted to Formula 1 in 2007. 

Race winner Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-22

Race winner Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-22

Motorsport Images

Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-22, leads team mate Fernando Alonso, McLaren MP4-22 out of the pits
Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, celebrates his first pole position
Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-22
Podium: Race winner Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, second place Fernando Alonso, McLaren, third Felipe Massa, Ferrari
Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-22

Hamilton, now a four-time world champion, was famously signed to partner Fernando Alonso at McLaren in ’07 as a rookie after winning the GP2 title the year before. 

While he made an instant impact – winning for the first time in just his sixth start in Canada, and fighting for the title until the final race – before the year began it was impossible to know how well he would perform.

Former McLaren mechanic Marc Priestley, who has released a book about his time in F1, said the news of Hamilton’s imminent arrival came as a shock inside the team.

“I remember working at McLaren when talk of Lewis Hamilton started arising,” he said. “He wasn’t a Formula 1 driver at that point, he was working in GP2, but he was starting to ruffle feathers, he was starting to be noticed by the Formula 1 fraternity.

“I remember people talking about him coming into McLaren as the next Formula 1 driver, and at the team we thought ‘Wow, this is crazy, this is just a young kid’ – not many people had even heard of him at that point.

“When he turned up, however, it was pretty clear he was a special kid. He was very very young, but he was super quick in a racing car.”

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