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Laurence Edmondson, F1 Editor
SAO PAULO — Lewis Hamilton will pay tribute to Ayrton Senna at this weekend’s Brazilian Grand Prix by driving demonstration laps in one of the three-time champion’s McLarens on Saturday.
This year marks 30 years since Senna’s death at the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix, and Hamilton, who was made an honorary Brazilian citizen in 2022, is set to drive the 1990 McLaren MP4/5B after qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix on Saturday.
The iconic car was used by Senna to secure his second career world championship and was also the first F1 car he raced at Interlagos, when he finished third at the 1990 Brazilian Grand Prix.
“I never in a million years thought I’d ever get to drive Senna’s car here,” Hamilton said on Thursday. “Someone contacted me, my manager told me about it, and I jumped at the opportunity.
“Back in the day, when I was at McLaren, I did get the chance to drive the MP4/4 around Silverstone, which was incredible. But just the thought of driving that car around here…
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“I remember the races when he finally won here [in 1991] and held the flag and yeah, it will definitely be quite an emotional experience and I hope people are here to see it.”
Hamilton said the demonstration run was intended to be a surprise for fans at the circuit, but the news leaked out ahead of the race weekend.
“I had a helmet made, his helmet, made for me, but I don’t know if we’re using that one. I think the initial hope was for it to be a surprise.
“So I had a whole white suit and his helmet and I’d go out and drive the lap and it would just look like it was him out there. But somehow it got out there. It’s impossible to keep things quiet!”
Hamilton is looking forward to using the car’s manual gearbox – a feature that was phased out of F1 cars in the early 1990s in favour of paddle shift gearboxes.
“It’s something I miss. I wish we had that in Formula 1. I mean, the two-pedal thing [brake and accelerator] is just not exciting, and they need to bring back the H-Box. It was awesome.”
Source: www.espn.com