Damon Hill advises Lance Stroll to look elsewhere than Aston Martin. The Canadian may be the son of team owner Lawrence Stroll, but if the 24-year-old wants to become world champion one day, Hill says he must also be able to stand on his own two feet. Only in this way could Stroll show his true potential.
“He needs to keep his form for a longer period of time,” the 1996 world champion said of Stroll in the F1 Nation podcast. According to Hill, it is not good if the driver from Montreal only sporadically shows himself from his best side. “He should make it his ambition to end Fernando Alonso’s career. That sounds intense, but George Russell is now also trying that with Lewis Hamilton.’
According to Hill, Stroll should present itself as the undisputed number one of Aston Martin, but according to the Englishman, the Canadian does not currently have the qualities of a champion. Maybe that’s the case with another team? Hill thinks so. “At the moment he will not become world champion on his own, not in the same way as Hamilton or Max Verstappen.”
“If he could, he would crush Alonso now,” continues Hill, who advises Stroll to go to “the next level.” “From my own experience I got to levels I didn’t understand until I was really forced to deliver. So I know that there is more potential in drivers than they think they know. The question is how to express that potential. It takes a lot of dedication and a lot of sacrifice.’
Is Stroll ready for the next step?
Nevertheless, Hill sees such a step for Stroll and therefore advises him to look beyond Aston Martin. “If he really wants to know the answer, he should drive for another team. Then he would escape all those problems and he would have to discover for himself how it all works’, concludes the former Formula 1 driver of Williams and Arrows, among others.
