The Formula One season may have finished but it seems Lewis Hamilton has had problems taking his foot off the gas ” the British racing driver was banned from the roads in France for a month after being clocked doing 196km/h (122mph) in a 130km/h limit.
With his licence suspended, Hamilton had to abandon his Mercedes CLK by the motorway, near the northern town of Laon, and was driven back to his hotel by police (a friend picked the car up). True to form, Lewis remained calm ” police spokesman Arnaud Dujardin said he was ”very polite and cooperative”.
He added that Hamilton ”recognized the infraction he committed straight away”, which is slightly harder to believe only because you get the feeling 196km/h must feel like an escargot”s pace to the runner-up in this year”s world championship ” a record ranking for a rookie ” by driving in excess of 320km/h on the race track.
As he is quoted as saying in a separate magazine interview this month: ”I drive the [F1] car gently and smoothly around the track, just at awesome speeds. And that”s how I do it on the road too, I cruise ” you”ve got to be cruising.”
Well, the place to do that is surely Germany, where motorways have no blanket speed limit ” something Michael Schumacher (seven-times F1 world champion) knew when he took over driving duties from his cabbie in order to make a flight on time.
”I found myself in the passenger seat, which was strange enough,” said taxi man Tuncer Yilmaz, ”but to have ”Schumi” behind the wheel of my cab was incredible.”
Apparently, the racing legend drove the Opel Vivaro ” which has a top speed of 163km/h (101mph) ” ”at full throttle around the corners and overtook in some unbelievable places”, before tipping the ”driver” ”100 on top of the ”60 fare.
And the reason for this action man”s journey? To collect a puppy, an Australian Shepherd (more laid back than its German counterpart?) named Ed. Welcome to the ”Schumi” family”