Lewis Hamilton has raced in F1 since 2007 and has come up against some fearsome rivals in that time, but one in particular left an impression on the Mercedes driver.
Lewis Hamilton has faced “one of the most talented drivers” in Robert Kubica, despite the fact that he has only won one Formula 1 race.
In his 99 Formula One starts, the Pole finished 12 times on the podium. Hamilton’s only victory occurred at the 2008 Canadian Grand Prix, when he collided with Kimi Raikkonen in the pits, allowing the BMW Sauber driver to cross the finish line unharmed and experience winning for the first time.
Perhaps many more might have followed – but we will never know. Kubica suffered serious injuries in a rally race in early 2011 which scuppered a planned move to Ferrari and effectively ended his F1 career.
He later returned to the grid in 2019 which was an extraordinary achievement in itself. But the Williams team he joined was not at all competitive and, at the end of that season, he left to race in the German DTM series while taking on a reserve role with Alfa Romeo.
As far as Hamilton is concerned, the crash robbed F1 of an extraordinary talent. He once said of the Pole: “I’ve known Robert the longest, we started racing each other in go-karts in 1998 – for me, Robert is one of the most talented drivers that I’ve competed against.
“From the beginning, I already saw the talent that he had. I think what’s really remarkable is the strength and the determination he’s shown to get through the incident he had.
Few people can emerge from those kinds of situations, return to the sport, and perform well against opponents who are not in the same circumstances as them. His return has been greatly appreciated. Although the circumstances are undoubtedly different from those from his days as a member of a successful squad, I believe he’s performed admirably this year.”
Kubica collaborated closely with Mike Krack, the current team principal at Aston Martin, while he was employed at BMW Sauber. He was so taken aback by the racer that, in 2022, the Luxembourger described him as “the best I’ve ever seen” when it came to driving skill.
Kubica found that final spell with Williams difficult, given just how poor the car was. He was also up against George Russell, in his rookie F1 season, who was heralded for his raw talent – something that the Pole later admitted was tough to swallow.
“People tend to forget that it was me who secured a world championship point with that car that year, and it was not an easy feat,” he stated in an interview with RacingNews365. “In my racing career, it was a significant turning point. It was the last stretch of the arduous journey I had to take in order to get back into an F1 car and to resume my life in general. A moment that, regrettably, not many people recall, but that’s the way things work in Formula 1.