The hope, determination and, sometimes, pain, that lies beneath the surface. Look at Isack Hadjar in Melbourne last week, when such a great performance in practice and Qualifying came to naught on the formation lap.
They all feel that, to greater or lesser degrees, since even those obliged by circumstance to run in the middle of the pack or at the back have their hopes and the dreams. And there was Zhou, racing in front of his countrymen, creating his own – and their – little bit of history.
READ MORE: ‘I felt for him like a father’ – Anthony Hamilton reveals what he said to Hadjar in heartfelt embrace
The only man from one of the world’s biggest nations to have achieved something that all who witnessed it will never forget. The boy from Shanghai who was only approaching five years old when he watched that home race back in 2004, and people he had raced this very day – Fernando, Lewis and Max Verstappen – had yet to win to be crowned World Champions.
Oddly and through the circumstances of the timing of tyre changes, he had set the race’s third fastest lap, behind Fernando and Max, and ahead of Lando Norris. Who knows whether there was another young child watching from the stands that day, in whom a similar fire of ambition had been lit…
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