{"id":54336,"date":"2025-08-08T11:09:06","date_gmt":"2025-08-08T11:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/54336\/"},"modified":"2025-08-08T11:09:06","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T11:09:06","slug":"smoke-out-of-the-bag-huge-clues-dropped-ahead-of-lewis-hamilton-announcement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/54336\/","title":{"rendered":"Smoke out of the bag? Huge clues dropped ahead of Lewis Hamilton announcement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After weeks of speculation, and fears he could be about to announce his F1 retirement, the cat appears to be out of the bag for Lewis Hamilton\u2019s much-debated \u201808.08\u2019 announcement. <\/p>\n<p>And no, he\u2019s not quitting the sport.<\/p>\n<p>The smoke led us to\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Hamilton caused a stir last month when he posted a cryptic message on Instagram, teasing an announcement that would be made on August 8.<\/p>\n<p>He posted a short clip that showed a matchbox on a table in a dimly lit room, emblazoned with \u201808.08\u2019, before the clip moved onto a collage of black-and-white photographs of volcanoes and architecture.<\/p>\n<p>In the accompanying caption, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planetf1.com\/driver\/lewis-hamilton\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hamilton<\/a> wrote: \u201cWe\u2019ve struck the match. Now follow the smoke.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Fans on social media speculated as to what the announcement could be, many fearing it was his retirement given the Briton\u2019s downbeat mood after the Belgian and Hungarian Grand Prix weekends.<\/p>\n<p>The good news is, with 99.999% certainty, it\u2019s not that. Not at all.<\/p>\n<p>More on seven-time F1 World Champion Lewis Hamilton<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udc49 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planetf1.com\/features\/hall-of-fame-lewis-hamilton\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Lewis Hamilton: The new superstar that Formula 1 was looking for <\/a><\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udc49 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planetf1.com\/news\/lewis-hamilton-ferrari-salary-ranked\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">10 biggest sports deals in history: Where does Lewis Hamilton\u2019s Ferrari salary rank? <\/a><\/p>\n<p>Instead the announcement relates to Hamilton\u2019s tequila brand, Almave.<\/p>\n<p>Almave is a company co-founded by Hamilton, creating the \u2018the first premium non-alcoholic blue agave spirit\u2019. <\/p>\n<p>Although Hamilton refused to give the game away when quizzed on the announcement at the HUngarian Grand Prix, saying \u201cI can\u2019t even give you a hint, no. You\u2019ve got to follow the smoke\u201d, Almave dropped a huge hint on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>Posting a clip on Instagram featuring the same \u201808.08\u2019 as Hamilton\u2019s initial post, Almave added: \u201cFrom the smoke, a new spirit awakens. Are you ready?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not Almave\u2019s first clue having posted five days earlier, \u201cSmoke rises. Senses awaken. A new ritual is born.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Official confirmation is yet to come, but for now Hamilton fans can breathe a bit easier.<\/p>\n<p>Read next: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planetf1.com\/news\/major-source-of-lewis-hamilton-frustration-claimed-ferrari-fairytale-falters\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Major source of Lewis Hamilton frustration claimed as Ferrari \u2018fairytale\u2019 falters<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After weeks of speculation, and fears he could be about to announce his F1 retirement, the cat appears&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54337,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,1613,932,44,82],"class_list":["post-54336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-home-page","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54336\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}