Hamilton debuted in Formula 1 in 2007 wearing a bright yellow helmet design similar to the one he had worn in his karting days, but changed to a white one in 2018. Furthermore, for the last two seasons, coinciding with a black car as a protest against the racism, has worn a purple and black helmet.
But ahead of the start of F1 2022, Hamilton revealed he would be wearing a yellow helmet again this year, claiming it was his “story” and that he wanted to “show love” to his “beginnings”.
Hamilton’s fluorescent yellow livery has also been carried over to some design elements of the Mercedes W13. His number 44 on the nose and on both sides of the engine cover is the same colour, while the wheel fairings also have bright yellow trim.
Hamilton explained that he wanted to bring back his old yellow helmet design to try to help fans better distinguish between the two Mercedes cars on track.
“What I have noticed and am sensitive to is that those who are watching the races on TV can’t tell the difference between the two cars, and that was an issue I raised with the team,” said Lewis Hamilton.
“I spent hours at home after the presentation, with my iPad, taking a picture and editing it in some kind of image editor, and sending those pictures of how the car livery would look best to Toto [Wolff] and Ola [Kallenius] “.
“I did some research, looked at what would be the most striking color and went back to yellow. So I asked to put that on the car.”
“Then I realized that you still can’t see helmets with the Halo very well, so I decided to give the helmet some real light.”
Hamilton’s car is also wearing the yellow T-cam this year, with the black being worn by his Mercedes team-mate George Russell. Traditionally the “number 1 driver” of the team wore the dark and the “second” the light. Russell’s car has red trim around the wheel fairings and the number number in blue on the front and engine cover.
Speaking during the Bahrain GP weekend, Hamilton also explained how he plans to incorporate his mother’s surname, Larbalestier, into his name.
The seven-time champion clarified that he would put Larbalestier as an extra middle name, and that he wanted it to be a surprise for his mother but it ended up being known at the Expo 2020 presentation in Dubai before Sakhir’s race.
“I was obviously sad when my grandfather passed away on my mother’s side, and because of that, I felt for quite some time that I wanted to add my mother’s name and my grandfather’s name to my name,” Hamilton said.
“I already have my grandfather on my father’s side on my middle name, which is Davidson. And obviously Hamilton. But it was supposed to be a surprise. It ended up being a surprise, but I was going to tell my mom before she was people saw it. He just ran away!”
“I already applied, and like I said, it won’t be a last name. It will be an addition to my middle name.”
