Lewis Hamilton was born7 January 1985. Hamilton began karting in 1993 at the age of eight, at the Rye House Kart Circuit and quickly began winning races and championships. He began his car racing career in the 2001 British Formula Renault Winter Series. He is racing driver from England, currently racing for the McLaren Mercedes team. At the age of ten, he approached McLaren team principal, Ron Dennis, at an awards ceremony and told him "I want to race for you one day."; less than three years later, he was bank-rolled by McLaren and Mercedes-Benz to their Young Driver Support Programme. After winning the British Formula Renault, European Formula Three and GP2 championship, he became a McLaren F1 driver for 2007, making his Formula One debut 12 years after his initial encounter with Dennis. Coming from a mixed-race background, with a black father and white mother, Hamilton is often labelled "the first black driver in Formula One". In his first season in Formula One, Hamilton set numerous rookie records and finished second in the 2007 Formula One Championship, behind Kimi Räikkönen by just one point. He has stated that he wants to stay with the McLaren team for the rest of his F1 career.
