Sir Lewis Hamilton has been at the pinnacle for Formula 1 for over a decade now, the British driver rising through the karting and junior formula ranks to cement himself as one of the greatest drivers to ever compete in the sport.

Hamilton was marked out early as a racing protege, signing a development contract with McLaren aged just 11 after a successful karting career, and has gone from strength to strength in F1 on his way to seven world championships with Mercedes.

But how did the man from Stevenage reach the top of the motorsport pyramid? Here is everything you need to know about the life of Sir Lewis Hamilton.

Early Career

The young Hamilton's long climb to Formula 1 started when he began competing in British karting championships aged eight, winning several trophies including the STEP karting championship, Champions of the Future, and the Super One Series.

The road to F1 began in earnest when Hamilton in 1998 became the youngest driver to ever be contacted by a team when he signed for the McLaren Driver Development Support programme, aged 13.

In the same year, he graduated to Junior Intercontinental A level racing, coming second overall in the McLaren Mercedes Champions of the Future , while in 1999 Hamilton moved to race in Intercontinental A and won the Italian Industrials Championship.

In his penultimate year racing karts, Hamilton won the European Formula A series, winning all four rounds, as well as the World Cup Championship in Japan, and the second round of the Italian Open.

Move to open wheel

In 2001, Hamilton brought his karting career to an end and moved into open-wheel racing in the British Formula Renault Winter series with Manor, placing fifth in his inaugural season and going on to win the championship the next year.

The future world champion stayed in the series the following year, dominating with nine out of ten wins in the final races of the season to take the title with room to spare ahead of his rivals.

With points to spare, Hamilton opted to miss the last two races of the year to make his British Formula 3 Championship debut.

However, the decision would prove to be ill-fated as the driver retired in the first race due to a puncture and was in the second a crash with teammate Tor Graves landed him in hospital.

After the crash, he switched to race still with manor in the Euroseries F3, winning in his first outing at the Norising street track, with further wins at the Bahrain F3 Superprix and the Macau F3 Grand Prix.

Having proved his winning potential, Hamilton was given the opportunity to test an F1 car for the first time in late 2004 with McLaren.

The following year, the driver swapped teams to race with ASM in the Euroseries, dominating the grid on his way to 15 of 20 race victories, as well as taking victory at the Marlboro Masters of Formula 3 at Zandvoort.

GP2 titles

Despite his overwhelming junior career success, Hamilton was still looking for a way to make it into a Formula 1 seat, and in a bid to secure a route onto the grid moved to GP2 with ASM sister team ART for the 2006 season.

The outfit had launched the career of Hamilton's future teammate and title rival Nico Rosberg, and the Brit was up against a tough grid of future F1 drivers including Nelson Piquet Jr and Timo Glock.

Battles with Piquet Jr especially in the first rounds of the championship set the tone for the season, but Hamilton began to find his stride and secured his first round at the fifth race at the Nurburgring despite earning a penalty for speeding in the pitlane.

Further wins at Monte Carlo and Silverstone came, and Hamilton won the race in odd circumstances at the last penultimate race of that year in Monza, where he was granted a bonus point for fastest lap after Giorgi Pantano was penalised for a yellow flag infringement.

With the success continuing to roll, the stage was set for the young Brit to fulfil his potential and make the step up into Formula 1.

McLaren and move to Formula 1

After capping off his junior career with a GP2 title in 2006, Lewis Hamilton burst onto the Formula 1 scene in 2007 by joining one of racing's most heralded teams, McLaren after a seat became available at the team following the departures of Juan Pablo Montoya to Nascar and Kimi Raikkonen to Ferrari.

The Brit faced competition from Pedro de la Rosa, who had subbed in for Montoya the previous year, and there was no guarantee that McLaren would opt for a rookie to fill the seat having not started a season with an inexperienced driver since 1993.

But ultimately, it was Hamilton who was given the drive, with team boss Ron Dennis explaining that he had "been in the family for a long time and he deserves the opportunity we are giving him."

Partnering two-time and defending World Champion Fernando Alonso, the Englishman quickly showed he belonged with the biggest names on the grid, standing on the podium on his debut and taking four wins in his rookie F1 season.The victories included two at Montreal and Indianapolis, and that year Hamilton also set a record for the most podiums in a row in a rookie season with nine on the trot following his maiden race.

The dream pairing would last for just one season as Alonso would terminate his contract at the end of the campaign after numerous incidents between the two and increased tension within the team.

Hamilton's scintillating start to life in F1 put him 12 points ahead in the world championship before Alonso began to hit back, but relations between the pair soured with a series of incidents including the Spaniard holding up his teammate in the pitlane after Hamilton looked to have ignored team orders to led the other man pass him during qualifying.

Meanwhile, Hamilton continued to push for the drivers' title, and running into the last few races of the season looked to have the better of his teammate and the Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen.

However, a series of incidents across the final two races, including retiring at the Chinese Grand Prix after a slide and a gearbox failure at the race in Brazil, caused the driver valuable points.

On the track, both McLaren drivers incredibly missed out on the world title by one point to Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, denying Hamilton the opportunity to become the first driver to win a Formula 1 title in his rookie year.

2008

Hamilton continued to impress in 2008, taking home five victories and 10 podium finishes. Nevertheless the British driver attracted his fair share of critics, as he was accused of arrogance and dangerous driving.

Nevertheless, Hamilton entered the final race of the season in a championship battle with Ferrari's Felipe Massa. The McLaren driver entered the race with a seven-point advantage in the standings, however the race at Interlagos was a tricky one with changing weather conditions.

The Brazilian started from pole on a wet track with Hamilton fourth. Massa took the chequered flag, meaning the Briton needed a fifth-place finish to take his first F1 world title. With light rain falling, one of F1's most incredible finishes took place.

Hamilton managed to find his way past Timo Glock on the final corner of the last lap in the last race of the season to finish fifth, as the Toyota driver couldn't find any grip with his dry-weather tyres on the wet track. The joy in the Ferrari garage, who had already begun to celebrate, quickly turned to despair as Hamilton became the youngest World Champion until Sebastian Vettel claimed that honour in 2010.

2009

It would be Hamilton’s only title with McLaren as Brawn took the field by storm in 2009.

The Brit’s 2009 campaign would start under a dark cloud when he was disqualified from the Australian Grand Prix after it was deemed he had provided the race stewards with deceptive information when Jarno Trulli passed him under the safety car to end the race.

The disappointment would continue for the entire season with Hamilton and McLaren clearly lacking the pace to defend the title against the dominant Brawn GP, with the driver registering just one victory all year.

However, he still managed to finish the season in fifth overall, behind the Brawn GP and Red Bull drivers.

2010-2012

Jenson Button would serve as Hamilton’s teammate from 2010 to 2012 but McLaren would find themselves unable to match the pace shown by Red Bull and Sebastian Vettel.

As the young German driver took his first of four world championships to come over the coming season, Hamilton had a much stronger season than the previous year, leading the championship at the halfway point after multiple wins. However, he would go on to finish in fourth overall.

The next year brought further trouble for the Brit, who had multiple crashes and retirements across the year and finished behind his teammate for the first time in the points standings, despite taking three wins across the year.

In 2012, McLaren once again found themselves trailing Vettel and Red Bull,, with a number of reliability issues hampering their campaign.

The end of that year would bring Hamilton and the team's long-running relationship to an end as the driver made a surprise announcement to leave the outfit that signed him as a teenager and join the revitalised Mercedes works team.

Mercedes move

As a result the Stevenage-native would leave the team he grew up with and replace the retiring Michael Schumacher at Mercedes for the 2013 season.

Seen by many as a gamble given the team’s lack of success, the move didn’t pay off immediately as Hamilton registered just one victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix in his maiden campaign.

Mercedes finished second in the championship that year, taking three wins with one for Hamilton and two for teammate Nico Rosberg, with the Brit edging out his teammate on the points tally over the course of the season.

Those days are long gone however, with Hamilton winning six of the last seven world titles as he looks to pass Michael Schumacher and bring home a record eighth crown in 2021.

2016-2018

Since the introduction of turbo-hybrid powertrains in 2014, Hamilton was one every single Formula 1 drivers' title, with the exception of 2016 when he was beaten to the punch by teammate Nico Rosberg.

The 2016 season saw Mercedes teammates fight throughout the year, with Rosberg at an advantage as his title rival suffered from reliability issues with car despite the team retaining its comfortable advantage over the rest of the pack from the previous year.

The pair clashed on multiple occasions, including a crash as Hamilton attempted to overtake his teammate at the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona which took both drivers out of the race.

Rosberg shocked the F1 world when he retired following his world title victory for the 2017 season, with Mercedes opting to replace him with Williams driver Valtteri Bottas to partner Hamilton.

That year Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel pushed Mercedes in the championship, with the German taking victory at the season opener in Australia while Bottas showed his calibre by taking wins in Russia and Austria.

Hamilton took yet another victory at his home grand prix in Silverstone, and brought home a string of wins after the summer break in Belgium, Singapore and Italy, leading the table into the last races and his third consecutive championship.

2018-2020

Mercedes continued to dominate in 2019, with Hamilton beating out challenges from Bottas and new Ferrari signing Charles Leclerc to secure the title once again with three races to spare, victory coming with a second place finish in the USA for title number six.

Like most drivers, Hamilton's 2020 season was impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, with the driver contracting the virus at the Sakhir Grand Prix in Bahrain and being forced to sit out a race.

However, despite a resurgent challenge from Red Bull and Max Verstappen, Hamilton managed to secure a record-matching seventh world championships on his way to breaking the record for most race wins in F1.

The driver took more than half of the race victories on offer in 2020, including another home grand prix win at Silverstone when his tyre punctured on the final lap and he had to bring the car over the line with three wheels.

2021

Ferrari and Red Bull have both on occasion challenged Mercedes for victories in the last few seasons, but Hamilton has managed to remain dominant, with the Brit's name on many of F1’s most heralded records, as he joined the legend Michael Schumacher with seven World Drivers’ Championships in 2020.

He also holds the record for most wins, pole positions and podium finishes.

Those successes on the track mean it’s no surprise that Hamilton is Formula 1’s highest paid driver, taking home a reported $79 million a year to go along with an estimated net worth of over $300 million.

Hamilton’s influence extends outside of F1 as well, with the Brit being a noted environmental and social activist while making Time’s list of the 100 most influential people in 2020.He’s also launched a vegan restaurant called Neat Burger and recently purchased, along with a high-profile group of investors, the fashion magazine W.

The driver also owns the X44 electric racing team, which participates in the sustainability-focussed off-road racing series Extreme E.