By James Broughton, November 11, 2024
Fat, swollen and turned ugly by his own demented rhetoric, Jeremy Clarkson—the former host of Top Gear and The Grand Tour, now leading the hit Amazon show Clarkson’s Farm—has recently shared his views on Lewis Hamilton. Clarkson opines that Hamilton, whom he considers too old for Formula One, should retire, claiming instead that Max Verstappen is the greatest F1 driver of all time.
Clarkson’s admiration for Verstappen seems strengthened by the Dutch driver’s impressive performance at the Brazilian Grand Prix, where Verstappen climbed from 17th on the grid to claim an unexpected victory. However, while Verstappen’s skill was certainly on display, a single race doesn’t necessarily define greatness.
Clarkson’s perspective on Hamilton, however, appears to be shaped by his experience with champions of the past, all of whom have been Normans, Anglo-Saxons and settler colonial Europeans from across the Atlantic.
Hamilton, with his mixed-race heritage, might represent a challenge to Clarkson’s traditional viewpoint—a challenge perhaps made even more uncomfortable by Hamilton’s unparalleled achievements in the sport.
It’s possible Clarkson views Hamilton through a colonial lens, rooted in outdated stereotypes about race, despite abundant historical and archeological evidence that Black people were the progenitors of civilisation. By contrast, Clarkson’s ancient European ancestors were probably shitting in a hole dug by hand and were likely living modestly in thatched mud huts.
Despite a career spent traveling the globe, Clarkson’s worldview seems largely unchanged and at times unhinged. In the 2014 Top Gear Burma special, for example, a racial slur directed at a Burmese worker was not only uttered but edited into the final cut.
The real problem with figures like Clarkson is their reluctance to fully acknowledge Hamilton’s achievements. Clarkson might make polite conversation with Hamilton, smile, even shake his hand, yet he likely struggles to see him as an equal.
For Clarkson, this is a black and white situation. Hamilton for him is an anomaly, an interruption in a long line of white British champions who have shaped F1. And that may be why Clarkson so easily dismisses the significance of Hamilton’s success.
