Ferrari announced prior to the action even commencing in 2024 the bombshell revelation that Hamilton has agreed a multi-year deal to move to the team next season.

The seven-time champion seemed poised to conclude his illustrious F1 career with Mercedes when he signed a new contract extension through 2025 12 months ago.

But successive winless seasons upon F1’s return to ground effect cars in 2022 and Ferrari’s approach prompted Hamilton to activate a break clause in the agreement.

Wolff admitted at the time that he was aware a switch could be in the works via rumours, but he “wanted to wait” until his planned meeting with Hamilton at his home.

Hamilton broke the news over breakfast, which the Briton, who has been with the German marque’s works setup since 2013, has recalled as being a nervous moment.

“It’s been a rollercoaster of emotions from the moment I signed the contract — telling my boss, that was terrifying,” Hamilton told the Times.

Hamilton has expressed that his memories of watching Michael Schumacher win five titles with Ferrari enticed him to accept the Maranello-based squad’s advances.

“But it is so exciting because I remember as a kid watching Michael,” he continued.

“Every driver watches that car and you’re like: ‘What would it be like to sit in the red cockpit?’”

Hamilton enduring ’emotional’ Mercedes countdown
Hamilton has ensured that he will bow out at Mercedes with a win this season as he ended his extensive 945-day wait with an emotional home triumph at Silverstone.

The ex-McLaren driver prevailed again at the Belgian Grand Prix to extend his record to 105 career victories in F1, with 84 coming since he moved to the Silver Arrows.

Asked at Monza last month whether it was getting more emotional as the races counted down, Hamilton replied: “It’s been there all year. Every single race you turn up.

“I love my team so much. We have been through a hell of a lot together so it will be emotional every single race.

“Because every race we do is the last time at that particular place. Every race we get closer and closer to the last time I’ll be in that Mercedes.

“It’s going to be tough, but my focus is just to do my best job for the team and to finish on a high.”

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Two Hendrick Motorsports drivers are on a fiery streak at present. Both dominated the podium spots last weekend – Kyle Larson swept off most of the Bristol race, and Chase Elliott landed in second place. They also have amazing odds of excelling at Kansas. While Larson executed a photo finish in the spring race, Elliott leads all drivers with a 10.2 average finish in 17 starts. However, Elliott may be counting on that.

The No. 9 Chevrolet driver is well aware of the challenges ahead. A beast of a 2.66-mile drafting track awaits drivers with fangs out and fists balled up. So Chase Elliott is counting his blessings and leaning on an exceptional performance this weekend.

Ever since Talladega Superspeedway was unveiled in 1969, drivers have feared the track. Ranging from Rusty Wallace’s violent airborne flip in 1993 right up to the multi-car tangle on the last lap this year, this track has never failed to terrify. Even Kyle Larson confessed to feeling relieved with the schedule: “I like that Kansas is first rather than being the last in the round.” So Chase Elliott is presently relying on the track he trusts – Kansas Speedway – to haul him out of a possible Talladega disaster.

He harped on Talladega’s fearsome nature: “Talladega always is…whichever round that one falls in every year, it’s always a bit unpredictable. You just don’t know what’s gonna happen.” Chase Elliott owns one 2018 victory at the 1.5-mile tri-oval among 8 top-five finishes. Although we have not attended a 1.5 miler since the Coca-Cola 600 race, Elliott likes to believe in the track’s classic nature that might rescue him. “So when you have those races in the rounds, it’s always really important to take advantage of I guess what you would call a traditional weekend.”

Chase Elliott affirmed his confidence in Kansas, where he clinched a top-five position earlier this year, as he continued. “I think this is certainly one of them. The way I look at that is, there’s more in my hands this weekend than there’s gonna be in Talladega next weekend. And I would like to take advantage of that, make it to where next week doesn’t matter.” Elliott owns two victories at Talladega – 2019 and 2022 – so you can imagine how that track can make even the stellar drivers tremble. Now that NASCAR has set off whispers of installing unnecessary air deflectors on cars, drivers are more tense.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. is arguably the most decorated NASCAR driver of his generation. While he might not have a championship trophy to his name, he does have a ton of race victories under his belt. 26 of them came competing in the Cup Series, whereas he added 24 wins to his name in the Xfinity Series. Not to mention, he won NASCAR’s Most Popular Driver award for fifteen years straight, from 2003 to 2017.

Now, it is a task in itself to keep hold of their trophies and collect them. In Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s case, his trophies are spread out in different places, right from his home, office, and even in HOF museums. However, he is most worried about the ones that are sitting at his home.

Junior’s wife, Amy Earnhardt, has a big say in which trophies and silverware will stay inside their house. It is indeed hard to imagine some 50-odd trophies being lined up as a collection inside Earnhardt’s house. Therefore, every year Amy handpicks the trophies she feels can be added to the home collection. And this time around the Daytona 500 and Bristol race wins, trophies were the lucky ones to be displayed.

However, there’s one big issue that has got Dale Jr. worried, and it’s the damage that can be inflicted upon Sharpie 500 silverware. “I was really happy about that. The Bristol trophy is in this one spot, but we don’t have another decoration that would work there because this spot’s kind of a really tall thing…it terrifies me because the Bristol trophy is the Sharpie 500, and on the corner of the trophies are Sharpies, and they’re little plastic Sharpies and I’m like waiting on one of them little girls to grab on them Sharpies.” Dale Jr. said this Ask Jr. segment of DJD.

He also confessed that he would want to conduct a census of all the trophies that he had won. And maybe one day build a grand collection remembering his victories on the racetrack. “I would love to take every trophy that I have and be able to put it on the wall and a big case and go, What are we missing? What’s not here? I’m not 100% sure I know where every single trophy is from the Cup or the Xfinity days, and so it’d kind of nice to kind of know which ones might not be around; find them; let’s track them down,” he added.

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