Danner: With age, a racer inevitably loses something.

      The average age of the top three finishers in the Miami Grand Prix is 23 years, 8 months, and 28 days. As everyone remembers, Kimi Antonelli won this race, and after three consecutive victories, he is leading in the individual standings, the 19-year-old Italian racing for Mercedes.

      Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton is already over forty, and discussions about the inevitable retirement of the seven-time world champion continue. If he were regularly making it to the podium, there would surely be less talk about this, but during his time with Ferrari, he managed to do so only once – about two months ago in Shanghai. And he mainly trails his teammate Charles Leclerc, although, according to Lewis, the new SF-26 car suits him quite well and even pleases him.

      Christian Danner, a former Formula 1 driver and now an expert for the Austrian publication Motorsport Magazin, commented on this: “Leclerc is a magnificent professional, a top-class driver, and at some point, Hamilton will no longer be able to keep up with him. We talked about this with Gerhard Berger, and he acknowledged that he reached an age when he simply could not perform at the same level anymore.

      He was still fast and won the German Grand Prix in 1997, but he felt that something had already been lost.”

      After that season, Berger retired from Formula 1 at the age of 38. Reflecting on what exactly a driver loses with age, Danner put it this way: “Everyone inevitably reaches their limit, but to go beyond it, you need to feel that special state, as if you are inside a special flow that carries you along. At that moment, everything works for you.

      Experiencing it, you realize that you are taking corners without even thinking about it, anticipating the next turn, navigating it, and then flooring it again. However, with age, reaching that state becomes increasingly difficult.”

      Juan Manuel Fangio won his fifth title at the age of 46 years, 1 month, and 11 days, but that was in 1957, almost seven decades ago, in a completely different era when Formula 1 was different.

      However, Fernando Alonso will turn 45 at the end of July, and few doubt his speed, but the Aston Martin car does not allow him to demonstrate that speed. The two-time world champion hints that he does not plan to retire just yet, at least he does not rule out continuing to race next year.

      “But if Alonso's teammate were not Lance Stroll, but Charles Leclerc, it is quite possible that he would look somewhat like Lewis does now in comparison. Most likely, this is the normal dynamic observed towards the end of a career,” Danner added. “Of course, I have long considered myself a veteran of motorsport, although I enjoy getting behind the wheel of a race car a few times a year – certainly not a Formula 1 car, but something from the GT class, or I pilot historical vehicles. After all, that’s somewhat easier.”