Hamilton wins fastest lap award in F1 2017

Lewis Hamilton won another award in this year’s Formula 1 World Championship as he drove most fastest laps in 20 races.

In the first five races, Hamilton had driven the fastest lap of the race three times and six times in the first ten races while in the second half of the season, in which he drove phenomenally and won the fourth title, he only took the fastest lap once.

The fastest lap is not a real indicator of the speed of the car in the race since 2010 where refueling was banned because the fastest laps were driven in the last laps since when cars are lightest. It means that a driver who changes his tyres late has big advantage so the fastest lap can be taken and someone who doesn’t have the fastest car.

Last season, the world champion Nico Rosberg (6 fastest laps) was rewarded, and Lewis Hamilton won the prize for in 2014 and 2015.

Interestingly, in the last six years the fastest lap award was taken by the world champion of that year (Hamilton, Rosberg, Hamilton, Hamilton, Vettel, Vettel). A series is interrupted by Webber who drove the most fastest laps in 2011 (7) when champion was his team mate Vettel.

WIN, POLE AND FASTEST LAP OVERVIEW

MOST FASTEST LAPS PER SEASON SINCE 2000

Let’s have a look at the drivers who had the most fastest laps since the season of 2000 and also a list of world champions in those seasons to see how often the world champion has the most fastest laps in the season.

For the last six seasons, the world champion had the highest number of fastest laps, but this was not the case in the four seasons before (2008 – 2011).

Raikkonen became world champion in 2007 with the same number of fastest laps as his team mate Massa, while Alonso did not have the highest number of fastest laps in his winning years (2005 and 2006). That’s why he did in 2010 when he painfully lost the title fight in the last race of the season in Abu Dhabi.

Michael Schumacher had four times in five years with the most fastest laps (2000-2004) but not in the year 2000, when McLaren and Ferrari were heading for an extremely tense fight for the championship.

That season, only two teams won races, won pole positions and set the fastest laps and the only driver who managed to lead the race by not driving the Ferrari or McLaren was Frentzen in Jordan who was in the lead on two races (a total of nine laps).