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Lewis Hamilton has been offered a sensational £62million-a-season contract by Mercedes to be sponsored by Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s firm Ineos – who are reportedly set to pay 90 per cent of the contract.
The seven-time Formula One champion’s current deal is around £ 40m a-year and expires at the end of the upcoming season.
But according to Sportune, the British F1 star has been offered to extend his stay with Mercedes – without a £22m bonus for winning the title, but with a big increase in his base salary.
It comes after Hamilton endured his worst-ever Formula One season after failing to win a race across the whole season.
It looks as though Wolff could be right as Hamilton weighs up whether to accept an astonishing new deal – which would see his base salary rise by £22m-a-season.
Instead of only getting the £22m bonus if he was to win an eighth championship, it appears that Hamilton would have this amount directly added to his base wage.
The reports claim that the contract also included a ten-year ambassador role at Mercedes for when the 38-year-old eventually retires – which is worth £22m-a-year.
Mercedes are sponsored by Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos – who are reportedly set to pay 90 per cent of the contract.
Sir Jim, 70, has made headlines this week after Ineos formally put forward their intention to buy Manchester United off the Glazer family – who put the club up for sale in November.
Ratcliffe, Britain’s wealthiest man, part-owns Mercedes and is friends with Hamilton. Hamilton expressed his desire to get into club ownership with Sir Jim in the future.
“Jim’s part boss but a partner – I’d say we’re more partners because we’re in this together, and I hope in future to do something with Jim and build with him,” Hamilton told the Manchester Evening News.
“I don’t know where that will be or what that will be, so I can’t really say. I haven’t had a call from him asking if I want to be involved in that (a United bid) just yet.
“But I do want to get more and more involved in teams because I really do believe in black ownership, there is a lack of it in sports. And black equity, again, there is a real lack of that.”
Hamilton was part of Sir Martin Broughton’s consortium that tried to buy Chelsea last year but it was Todd Boehly who was successful.
