How Lewis Hamilton nearly signed for shock F1 team

Sauber F1 founder Peter Sauber has disclosed that Lewis Hamilton came close to joining his team ahead of the 2007 Formula 1 season.

At the time, Hamilton was fresh off winning the 2006 Formula 2 championship and was widely expected to secure a seat at McLaren. However, there was some uncertainty over whether the team could accommodate him immediately, with Juan Pablo Montoya and Kimi Raikkonen occupying the two race seats.

That situation soon changed when Montoya departed McLaren to pursue a career in IndyCar, allowing Pedro de la Rosa to step in on a temporary basis, while Raikkonen agreed a move to Ferrari starting in 2007.

These developments opened the door for Hamilton to move straight into a race seat with the Woking-based team, where he went on to challenge for the world championship in his rookie season alongside two-time champion Fernando Alonso.

But now, Peter Sauber has revealed that his team almost took Hamilton on loan from McLaren for a season or two.

"Then the deal fell through because McLaren wanted to loan him out for just one season, while we insisted on a two-year loan."

Sauber's farewell

While Hamilton certainly benefitted from being thrown straight into the deep end at McLaren - winning the drivers' championship in his second season - BMW Sauber did pretty well themselves, managing second in the constructors' championship in 2007.

The next season actually saw them claim their one and only win as an F1 constructor too, with Kubica claiming success at the 2008 Canadian Grand Prix.

2025, however, was the final season in which the Sauber name was competing in the sport, with Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg guiding them to a ninth-place finish before Audi enter the sport in 2026.

Audi have taken over the Sauber team, but have maintained various key aspects of the team, with Bortoleto, Hulkenberg and team principal Jonathan Wheatley all staying in their posts.

It meant that the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix brought to an end 32 years of Sauber running in the sport, after the team first entered the 1993 South African Grand Prix in Kyalami.

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