Why 2017 would be Hamilton's greatest title

Lewis Hamilton hasn't won the 2017 Formula 1 world championship, and he might yet lose it to Sebastian Vettel. Should Hamilton succeed, it will be the greatest of what will then be four title victories. And if he doesn't, either he'll have thrown it away or suffered some remarkable misfortune.

To claim this could become his best title win is not to say the others were in some way unworthy. But it reflects a confluence of conditions and performances, some within Hamilton's power to influence and others entirely outside of that.

Cast your mind back to July and things weren't going especially well for Hamilton. Having lost a surefire victory, and ground to Vettel in the title fight, thanks to a loose headrest in Azerbaijan, Hamilton finished only fourth in Austria after picking up a grid penalty for a gearbox change while his rival was a close second to Valtteri Bottas.

Given his recent history of not always processing and reacting to adversity in the best possible manner, there was a genuine risk that Hamilton's title push would unravel. But after trading wins with Vettel at Silverstone and the Hungaroring, Hamilton has shown no such weakness.

So what is it about this campaign that's particularly impressive? Firstly, while the challenge from within the Mercedes team is weaker - an established Nico Rosberg at the top of his game would surely have posed a bigger threat than newcomer Bottas - there has been serious opposition from Ferrari and Vettel.

The 'supertime' gap between Mercedes and Ferrari this year is marginally closer than the last time two teams were involved in the title fight in 2008

What's more, that's a Ferrari team focused fully on Vettel's title bid compared to a Mercedes squad where greater competition is permitted. So that's not an easy situation to deal with.

Two of Hamilton's titles have come without any serious opposition from a rival team - in 2014 and '15, when the only significant rival was team-mate Rosberg. In '14, Hamilton did struggle in the aftermath of the Monaco qualifying controversy (where he suspected that Rosberg deliberately went off to trigger a yellow flag and protect pole position), before stringing together a stunning end of the season. The year after, Rosberg was unable to mount a serious challenge.

But Hamilton's first title, in 2008, was very different. That year, it was a two-team battle between Hamilton at McLaren and Felipe Massa at Ferrari. It was a great fight, culminating in arguably the most dramatic denouement ever witnessed, with Hamilton passing Timo Glock with only 20 seconds of the season remaining to nab the extra point he needed.

But there were plenty of errors that year from Hamilton, which is to be expected from a young driver in only his second season in F1 - notably the moment of inattentiveness in Canada that resulted in him smashing into the parked Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen at a red light at the pit exit.

Perhaps the most impressive thing has been the past two race weekends. In Singapore, Hamilton said after qualifying that he needed a miracle to limit the ground lost to Vettel in the points race, and ended up winning. Yes, the start shunt that resulted in both Ferraris and Max Verstappen retiring played a big part in that, but Hamilton was there to capitalise when he could.

It was a similar story in Malaysia last weekend. The Ferraris were faster, hit trouble and Hamilton recovered from an appalling run in Friday practice to take second place. He didn't put a foot wrong in that race, and unlike Vettel's reaction to a slow start in Singapore, he was unflustered by Verstappen passing him at Sepang.

That can be portrayed as extremely easy pickings - just wait for Ferrari and/or Vettel to get it wrong and profit. Anyone can do that, right? Well, that's to underestimate the nature of elite sport and the unique pressures on the athletes.

It's very easy to make glib comments about how high-level professional athletes are overpaid, overprivileged and have an easy time of it. After all, one common complaint is that this isn't real pressure - try being in the military in a war zone.

It's true that elite sport isn't life and death - although occasionally it can be in motorsport. But that's what it feels like to those in the spotlight.

Not many people went to see the movie Borg vs McEnroe, which was released in the United Kingdom last month. That's a shame, not just for those who enjoy good cinema, but also for those looking for an insight into the intensity of elite sport.

A fictionalised account of the famous 1980 Wimbledon face-off between Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe ostensibly has little to do with the 2017 Formula 1 season, but what it encapsulates brilliantly is the pressure that any top-level athlete faces. And that includes Hamilton.

Returning to McEnroe, there's a press conference recreated during the movie after the American's infamous "you cannot be serious" outburst while playing Jimmy Connors in the semi-final.

"You know, I go out there and give everything for this game," says the fictional version of McEnroe. "Everything, everything in me gets left out on the fucking court, and none of you understand it because none of you do it."

The intense pressure piled on McEnroe as the man who will beat Borg, and on Borg himself as the machine who will win a fifth consecutive Wimbledon title, forms the heart of the movie. Both deal with it in different ways, and are at very different points in their careers, but the expectation, the pressure, the stakes are portrayed as almost suffocating at times.

Still don't believe it? Well, that intensity led to Borg retiring just over a year after the movie is set, having been beaten in the 1981 Wimbledon final by McEnroe. That's the same intensity that played a key role in Rosberg's mic-drop retirement as reigning world champion.

At the highest level, the mental side is critical. It's why you always hear drivers talking about taking one race at a time and not thinking about the championship; if you get drawn into thinking about the big picture, the more immediate little picture of doing the best possible job in every corner, lap, practice session and race is neglected.

It's impossible to be sure what these pressures do to drivers. Take Vettel's move at the start in Singapore. Having made a bad getaway, did the knowledge of the stakes, and the need for Ferrari to take every opportunity to win, lead to his overly-aggressive defence? Perhaps.

Vettel's baffling moment under the safety car in Baku and the Singapore disaster show he's the one who has cracked, while Hamilton has stood firm

Having been very critical of that decision, and justifiably so, it doesn't mean that it's not understandable. Elite sport leaves nowhere to hide, and while that might have been the reason Vettel made such a bad decision, it's right for the watching world (at least, those not blaming Verstappen) to be critical of it.

After all, to win at this level is a game of mind over matter. It's living in the pressure cooker of scrutiny and expected performance for months on end, dealing with constant questions, continual challenges and the fact that, as with Borg and McEnroe in the movie, when you are alone in your own head, you can't be as sure you can withstand it as you have to be in the key moments of battle.

Had Vettel held the lead in Singapore and won, it might well have looked very easy. But it's the need to calm this mental turmoil that makes that kind of win so impressive. That's what makes Hamilton capitalising on it and winning against the odds in Singapore so remarkable. It's what makes him digging deep and grabbing an unlikely pole position at Sepang the stuff of a champion.

As Hamilton said himself, since winning at Silverstone he has been on the crest of a wave and has turned the tables on Vettel. To do that, it's meant he hasn't made any big mistakes, no split-second misjudgements, never let the fact that everyone in the wider world is more interested in the big picture than in the millions of minute details that make the real difference distract him.

The bottom line is that the margins have been infinitesimally small this year. And Hamilton has not been the one to crack, despite having the opportunity to do so early in the year. Vettel is the one who has, with his baffling moment under the safety car when he hit Hamilton in Baku, and the Singapore disaster, while Hamilton has stood firm. Even at Spa, under pressure from Vettel in a Ferrari that was quick in the race, he delivered the goods. And he's continued to do so.

That might change, the pressure of getting so near to the ultimate goal might yet cause Hamilton to lose focus and become his own worst enemy. That could result in Vettel nicking back the championship, and it will mean the provisional conclusions made above about the Hamilton we've seen this season will have to be revised.

Based on what we've witnessed, Hamilton is stronger than ever and he will march towards the championship over the coming five races.

If he does it, it might look easy. It will have been anything but.