After winning the Canadian Grand Prix for the fifth time in his career early this year, Lewis Hamilton dedicated his victory to boxing legend Muhammad Ali. “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee,” he said on the team radio, quoting Ali. Hamilton has spoken about the boxing legend's influence on him, and how their shared ethnicity strikes a chord with him.
Like a top boxer, Hamilton has shown he can fight back despite taking a few punches. The three-time world champion had a 43-point deficit after the first five races, but has overturned it to a 19-point lead in the drivers' standings after 12 rounds.
As the Formula One circus reconvenes in Belgium this weekend after the summer break, Hamilton will carry the momentum, having won four races in July.
His Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg started the season strongly, winning the first four races, while Hamilton struggled with reliability issues and poor starts.
But things changed after the Spanish Grand Prix where the duo collided on the opening lap. Since then, Rosberg’s form has dipped, and he will quickly need to find his mojo if he has any chance of putting up a fight for the championship.
The summer break couldn't have come at a better time for the German who had a string of poor races. He crashed into Hamilton in Austria and was handed a penalty for pushing Max Verstappen off the track in Germany.
The fact that Rosberg has extended his contract with Mercedes for the next two years should help him get his focus back on track.
Ever since the rule change in 2014, Mercedes has enjoyed a clear pace advantage over the rest of the field. It is imperative that Rosberg makes use of this opportunity to go all the way after finishing second for the last two years.
With Red Bull slowly catching up, and with new technical rules to be introduced in 2017, this could be Rosberg’s best opportunity to enter the record books as only the second father-son duo to win a world championship, after Graham and Damon Hill. Keke Rosberg won the F1 championship in 1982.
Red Bull Racing, which has been struggling due to an under-powered Renault engine for the last two years, has managed to move up to second place in the constructors' championship.
Ferrari’s fortunes have nosedived despite vowing to fight for the title at the start of the year. The team is in a state of flux after its technical director James Allison left the team last month. Widely regarded as one of the best in the business, Allison’s absence could have disastrous consequences when the new rules kick in next year.
Over the last few races, Sebastian Vettel has had to override strategy calls from the pit lane often, an area in which his team has been found wanting so far this season. It remains to be seen how long his patience will hold.
While the German has contract with the Italian marque till the end of next year, and is reportedly on the verge of signing an extension, one more bad year could see him turn his back on the team.
With nine races to go, the upcoming weekend at the iconic Spa Francorchamps circuit, the scene of Hamilton and Rosberg’s infamous collision two years ago, could set the platform for Rosberg to get up and fight back, or for Hamilton to land the knockout punch.
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