The Rise of Youth

As McLaren's Lewis Hamilton drove to another studied and controlled win in Sunday's United States Grand Prix, the weekend's most telling achievement was unfolding way behind the race and championship leader.

BMW's Sebastian Vettel, deputising for Robert Kubica after the Pole's high-speed shunt in Canada the previous weekend, succeeded Jenson Button as the youngest points scorer in Formula One history.

Button was 20 years and two months old when he achieved his first points finish for Williams in the Brazilian Grand Prix of 2000. Vettel pipped that by around ten weeks in establishing the new benchmark.

It's the sort of achievement that would have rated racing headlines just a few years ago. Yet, in the current F1 climate, it barely raised an eyebrow.

While Vettel didn't disappoint, there was also the feeling that he could have done more with the opportunity. Running off the circuit at the first corner lost him precious positions, and he failed to stay with 122 GP veteran teammate Nick Heidfeld throughout the race.

So, 'solid but not spectacular' was the general consensus - about a debutant driver who had just broken one of the sport's records.

That said, it's hard to get excited about a new entrant scoring a single point on debut when another 2007 rookie is making the sport's established stars look ordinary. Hamilton's form in his first seven GP has turned the extraordinary into the routine, the wildly optimistic into the expected.

Hamilton's success also seems to have had a galvanizing effect on the other young drivers in the field. At one of the oldest and most historic race tracks in the world, the Indianapolis weekend was characterised by success for the young stars - and disappointment and desperation for the older generation.

While Vettel was setting one new record and Hamilton extending another (successive podium finishes for a rookie), Renault's Heikki Kovalainen continued his quiet but steady improvement after a shaky start in F1.

Initially outclassed by Giancarlo Fisichella, Kovalainen is finally getting on equal terms, and his fifth position was well deserved.

Nico Rosberg again out-raced his much more experienced Williams team-mate Alexander Wurz and, further down the field, Adrian Sutil was scrapping gamely with cars that should have been well ahead of the Spyker.

Hamilton may be the pick of the pack, but the newcomers acquitted themselves superbly at Indianapolis.

Instead, it was the longer-term stalwarts of F1 who were glad to see the back of a bitterly disappointing weekend. The beleaguered Ralf Schumacher again succumbed to a first corner mistake, this time taking out fellow greybeard David Coulthard in the Red Bull.

Giancarlo Fisichella scuppered what looked like a promising strategy by spinning and losing track position early in the race, and the Honda pairing of Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button must be wondering if things can get any worse.

For Button, particularly, there was harsh irony. The Briton's precocious entry into F1 caused heated debate at the time about whether it was wise or even fair to subject the other drivers to the on-track risks posed by such a greenhorn.

Alain Prost leads Williams teammate Damon Hill in the 1993 Australian Grand Prix © LAT

Button's calm and mature response to the pressures placed upon him was a significant factor in opening the doors for other inexperienced drivers like Kimi Raikkonen, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel.

It would be tempting to include Lewis Hamilton in that list, but he is a rookie in name only, and is arguably the best-prepared driver ever to enter the formula.

It's not just his long-term development programme with the team, the exhaustive technical programme that has familiarised him with every nut and bolt of the McLaren MP4-22, or the fitness training programme that has put him on par with Olympic athletes.

Hamilton has apparently also tackled the team's state of the art simulator with the tireless addiction of a computer gaming junkie.

Still, preparation can only take a driver so far. Delivering results in the heat of racing throws up challenges that no amount of simulator seat time, physical fitness or technical familiarisation can answer. Hamilton's skill is clearly more than the sum of its constituent parts.

In taking his second GP win straight after the first, Hamilton emulated England's other two recent F1 heroes, Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill.

Intriguingly, there is another factor that is common to all three. When he scored his back-to-back wins at Hungary and Belgium 1993, Hill had four-time champion Alain Prost in the sister Williams.

Mansell achieved his double in Europe and South Africa 1985, with 1982 champion Keke Rosberg as the other Williams driver. So all three achieved their 'maiden doubles' against world champions in identical machinery.

Such historical trivia will be of lesser interest to Hamilton than the third factor that links Hill and Mansell - that each had to wait a long time after those first victories before claiming their championship crowns.

It took Hill three years, while Mansell had to endure an exasperating seven year stretch, as first Alain Prost and then Ayrton Senna stole his thunder.

Hamilton clearly does not intend to have such a long wait. As much as he tries to divert attention from talk of his championship prospects, there can be no other way forward.

Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton on the podium in Indianapolis © LAT

Hamilton no longer needs to prove himself by taking pole positions, podium finishes or even wins. In just seven GP, he's put that behind him. The championship title is the logical and accessible next rung of the ladder. He knows it, the F1 world knows it, and Fernando Alonso surely knows it.

For one brief moment during Sunday's race, when Alonso swerved sharply towards his own pit wall, it seemed that the growing sense of competition between the two McLaren stars may boil over into a public confrontation.

If this was the type of signal that Alonso was sending mid-race, then surely we would see a post-race press conference punctuated by scowls and terse comments about team favouritism.

Instead, Alonso seemed uncharacteristically cheerful on the podium, putting his arm around Hamilton and saluting the crowd in a convincing display of team harmony and unity.

Alonso's post-race explanation, that his dive towards the pit wall was merely to pull out of Hamilton's slipstream and clear away some of the carbon dust that he'd collected from the leading McLaren's brakes, was a patent cover. He could have achieved that by moving just a couple of metres to one side.

Alonso's transition from mid-race frustration to post-race graciousness and smiles may be partly explained by his view that the team are now celebrating McLaren's success rather than just Hamilton's.

However, it could also stem from his realisation that the die is now cast and uncertainty removed. After Indianapolis, he reflected the calm of a man who has made his mind up.

For several races now, the rest of the field have pinned their hopes on the belief that Hamilton must crack sooner or later. Alonso knows the mindset well, because that is exactly how his rivals reacted to his own remarkable consistency in the Renault during 2005 and 2006. Alonso didn't crack then, and he knows better than to rely on Hamilton folding now.

With team favouritism and team-mate mistakes out of the equation, Alonso has only one path to follow if he wants to win his third championship. He will have to do it the old-fashioned way - by beating his rival fair and square on the track.

Earlier in the season, Alonso tried ambitious first corner moves in Spain and Canada, both of which backfired on him. He also failed to open up the early championship lead that had marked both of his successful campaigns at Renault.

If he took one certainty away from Indianapolis, it was the realisation that there are no shortcuts to this championship. It's not going to be won early via risky first-corner moves, mind games, greater reliability, or an unassailable early advantage. Instead, he will have to grind it out over the full seventeen races.

That, in turn, means that petulance (either on or off the track) is a luxury that Alonso can no longer afford. He has stated that his championship challenge will start in France.

Hamilton should take that as a signal that he will enjoy no more free gifts, like the one Alonso handed him in Canada. It is, no doubt, nothing less than Hamilton expects, and a challenge that he will relish.

Led by Hamilton, the field's young guns hinted on Sunday that experience is no longer a determining factor in F1 success. Fernando Alonso has the quiet confidence of a man who is sure that he can prove them wrong.

Even with the Ferrari duo slipping back out of the championship frame, the 2007 championship is shaping up to be a classic.