Arnold Schwarzenegger's presence in Melbourne leads to pun-filled headlines after Lewis Hamilton dominates on Saturday and Sunday
Monday 16 March 2015 15:04, UK
Lewis Hamilton’s “termination” of the opposition was the theme of Monday’s sports pages after the Mercedes driver romped to victory in Australia.
The presence of Arnold Schwarzenegger for the post-race podium interviews gave Fleet Street the perfect pun as the reigning world champion dominated Saturday and Sunday at Albert Park.
‘Ruthless champion proves he is still the terminator’ declared Daniel Johnson in the Daily Telegraph.
‘Hamilton - the cyborg assassin, the undisputed governor of F1, the phenomenal athlete - obliterated the opposition with machine-like precision. Pole position, fastest lap, chequered flag. Job done,' he added.
‘Do not let the margin of victory over his team-mate Nico Rosberg – 1.3 seconds – fool you. This was taken at a canter. His supremacy over Rosberg, not to mention the rest of the field, has deepened, perhaps substantially. Hamilton is well on the way to making himself indestructible.’
Kevin Eason echoed those sentiments in The Times, but admitted that Hamilton’s dominance had perhaps made the season-opener somewhat of an anti-climax.
‘Hamilton was also “the Terminator”, providing the incentive for a legion of Formula 1 fans to reach for the remote to turn the television off before heading back to the warmth of a comfy bed,” he wrote.
‘It is not Hamilton’s fault; he was peerless as he drove to victory. He started where he left off in Abu Dhabi at the end of last season, when he took his second world title.’
In The Sun Ben Hunt wrote: ‘Lewis Hamilton looked like the Terminator as he ruthlessly annihilated the field in Melbourne.
‘The world champion was like a machine calculating his way past defenceless victims en route to winning the Australian GP.’
His pit-stop aside, Hamilton led from start to finish in Melbourne and The Guardian’s Paul Weaver already suspects the world champion dealt a knockout blow to Rosberg.
‘Lewis Hamilton’s stroll in Albert Park yesterday was an imperious dismissal of his team-mate Nico Rosberg’s Formula 1 aspirations,' Weaver concluded.
‘He is driving the strongest car out there and when he looks at his only serious rival, Rosberg, he knows that he is a whole class better. And so does Rosberg.’
Sebastian Vettel completed the podium with third place on his Ferrari debut, but The Independent’s David Tremayne isn’t convinced the Scuderia have actually improved.
‘Before everyone gets carried away on the red tide, it is worth pointing out that Vettel was 34.5 seconds behind Hamilton, and that last year Fernando Alonso finished 35 seconds behind Rosberg,’ he wrote. ‘Is that progress?’
The Midweek Report returns at 8.30pm on Sky Sports F1 on Wednesday with Mike Gascoyne and David Brabham joining Natalie Pinkham in the studio to analyse events in Melbourne.
