{"id":173667,"date":"2025-09-27T21:23:14","date_gmt":"2025-09-27T21:23:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/173667\/"},"modified":"2025-09-27T21:23:14","modified_gmt":"2025-09-27T21:23:14","slug":"only-one-driver-on-the-2025-formula-1-grid-treats-racing-as-a-job-rather-than-a-calling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/173667\/","title":{"rendered":"Only one driver on the 2025 Formula 1 grid treats racing as a job rather than a ‘calling’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Matt Bishop has worked with some Formula 1 greats during his stints as communications chief at McLaren and Aston Martin. He has spent nine years in the sport overall. <\/p>\n

When Bishop joined McLaren, Jenson Button had just arrived to partner Lewis Hamilton. He was able to observe two world champions up close for three seasons.<\/p>\n

Only two years after Hamilton left for Mercedes, Fernando Alonso returned to Woking. Bishop stepped away from F1 in 2017 before his return with Aston Martin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He saw Sebastian Vettel\u2019s final season on the grid and then reunited with Alonso. But Lance Stroll<\/a>, teammate to the two legends, left a unique impression.<\/p>\n

Lance Stroll never gave the impression that he was \u2018put on Earth to drive\u2019<\/p>\n

Writing in a recent column for Motorsport Magazine<\/a>, Bishop pointed out that Stroll often looks \u2018melancholic\u2019. He questioned whether he has the \u2018resolve\u2019 to walk away from F1.<\/p>\n

Bishop says all the drivers he\u2019s worked with during his time in motorsport shared an unshakeable conviction that they were \u2018put on Earth\u2019 to race cars. Stroll was the only exception.<\/p>\n

During his two years at Aston, Bishop said he never got the impression that Stroll saw F1 as his \u2018calling\u2019. For him, it was simply a job.<\/p>\n

\"LancePhoto by Mark Sutton \u2013 Formula 1\/Formula 1 via Getty Images<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not necessarily a problem. By the end of this year, Stroll will almost certainly rank third on the list of most races without a win, but he can still be satisfied with a career that\u2019s yielded three podiums and over 300 points.<\/p>\n

But it certainly marks him out. It\u2019s been suggested that Stroll is living his father\u2019s dream<\/a>, having made it onto the grid with the help of the billionaire fashion mogul.<\/p>\n

How much money does Lance Stroll earn at Aston Martin?<\/p>\n

Stroll\u2019s contract runs until the end of next year<\/a>, so he\u2019ll soon have to decide whether he wants to continue if indeed his appetite is limited. The seat will be there for him if he so desires.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s believed that Stroll earns around \u00a32.2m per year at Silverstone. That\u2019s roughly a tenth of what highly decorated teammate Alonso is taking home.<\/p>\n

RANKDRIVERACTIVE YEARSRACES1Nico Hulkenberg2010-20, 2022-present2432Andrea de Cesaris1980-942083Kevin Magnussen2014-20, 2022-241854Nick Heidfeld2000-111835Lance Stroll2017-present182The F1 drivers who have made the most appearances without winning<\/p>\n

Aston Martin were \u2019embarrassed\u2019 by a monosyllabic Stroll interview<\/a> after the Italian GP. It\u2019s not the first time he\u2019s shown next-to-no interest in his media duties, but one can understand how they may be draining.<\/p>\n

A recent report claimed that Stroll considered retiring at the end of 2023<\/a>. When asked, he indicated that this wasn\u2019t true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Matt Bishop has worked with some Formula 1 greats during his stints as communications chief at McLaren and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173668,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[2495,64,63,10310,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-173667","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-aston-martin","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-lance-stroll","12":"tag-motor","13":"tag-motor-sports","14":"tag-motosport","15":"tag-motosports","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173667\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}