Lewis Hamilton Gets It

When firing up the original Gran Turismo, the seven-time Formula 1 champ goes for one of the best cars in the game.

By: Chris Perkins

Apr 14, 2024 at 3:00pm ET

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Normally, we don't pay much attention to promo videos from Formula 1 teams. But Lewis Hamilton playing turn-of-the-millennium racing games is different. These are games we all have a lot of nostalgia for, as does Hamilton, who managed to find the time to play the likes of F1 2000, and Gran Turismo. It's that last one we're most excited to see the seven-time champ play.

On putting the disc into a PlayStation 1, Hamilton immediately picks a Midnight Purple R33-generation Nissan Skyline GT-R and gets into a race at Trial Mountain. Both connoisseur's choices if we do say so ourselves. While GT1 had a nice selection of 37 cars in its arcade mode, the GT-R was one of the best. Really, those early games were defined in large part by the Skyline GT-R. Buying one in the game's career mode was always a good investment, as any hardcore player is aware. It seems Hamilton really knows the game.

You might be thinking why not a Mercedes? The German automaker only joined the franchise in Gran Turismo 2. (Hamilton's future employer, Ferrari, only showed up in Gran Turismo 5.)

What do you think?

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Hamilton also seems to be fond of the color purple, and a social media video from 2022 shows he's into Skyline GT-Rs, too. In that video, he drives a rented R34-generation GT-R, but that car came out after Gran Turismo's 1997 launch.

If there were any lingering doubts about Hamilton's car-enthusiast bonafides, there shouldn't be. His choice of Gran Turismo car shows he's one of us.