Lewis Hamilton proclaimed as the GOAT by former F1 world champion

Lewis Hamilton has been proclaimed the greatest of all time by former world champion Damon Hill after the Mercedes driver's win at the British GP on Sunday. The seven-time world champion was back in the winner's circle after two-and-a-half years as he won at Silverstone for a record-extending ninth time.

The 39-year-old started the race from P2 behind his teammate George Russell and was always in contention for the race win through the changing conditions last weekend.

He got the on-track advantage after the final round of pit stops, as he was able to undercut race leader and McLaren driver Lando Norris and then held off a charge from Max Verstappen to get the race win.

With the 104th win of his legendary career, Lewis Hamilton broke several records, such as becoming the first driver to have a podium in 18 seasons and a race win in 16 seasons. Former F1 world champion Damon Hill on his social media platform praised the long list of achievement, writing on X(formerly known as twitter):

"I think that confirms the literal definition of GOAT."

In his post-race interview, Lewis Hamilton spoke about the overpowering emotions that he experienced after he won the British GP and said:

"Yeah, I can't stop crying. I think, you know, since 2021, I’m just... every day getting up, trying to fight, to train, to put my mind to the task and work as hard as I can with this amazing team and this is my last race here, the British Grand Prix, with this team so I wanted to win this so much for them because I love them.

"I appreciate them so much, all the hard work they’ve been putting in over the years. I'm forever grateful to everyone on this team, everyone at Mercedes, and all of our partners." he added.

Lewis Hamilton analyzes his race win at Silverstone

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton revealed that the plan was for him to go longer between pit stops, as compared to his teammate and pole-sitter George Russell.

In his post-race press conference, the 39-year-old said:

"I was supposed to go a lot longer than George. He had a really great pace, and he was trying, obviously, to break the tow, so I was trying to make sure that I stayed within 1.6 or two seconds.

"And then I knew that I could see the rain was coming. And when that rain came, I knew that that was the moment to pounce." he added.

Hamilton further mentioned that after getting passed by both McLarens in the rain, he was "just trying to hold on". But he was excited when he and the team perfectly timed the final pitstop, and to have got "that undercut on Lando I think was really key." He also had praise for the Mercedes pit crew, saying, "[T]he team did such a great job with the pit stop as well."