Formula 1: When will Lewis Hamilton mathematically clinch 2018 championship?

With five races remaining in the 2018 Formula 1 season, Lewis Hamilton has a 50-point lead in the driver standings. When will he clinch the championship?

Four-time Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport leads fellow four-time champion Sebastian Vettel of Scuderia Ferrari by 50 points (306 to 256) in the driver standings with five races remaining on the 21-race 2018 Formula 1 schedule.

For all intents and purposes, the championship battle is over. Barring a disaster, Hamilton will become the third driver in Formula 1 history to win his fifth championship this year, not Vettel.

The only question that remains is this: after which of the 2018 season’s final five races will Hamilton mathematically clinch his fifth career Formula 1 championship to move into a second place tie with Juan Manuel Fangio behind seven-time champion Michael Schumacher on the all-time titles list?

With a 50-point lead over Vettel in the driver standings, Hamilton can sit out two races and still be ahead of Vettel assuming that Vettel does not win both of the races that Hamilton misses. This effectively means that he needs to show up and race hard in three of the season’s final five races.

However, considering the fact that Hamilton hasn’t missed a Formula 1 race since the 2006 season, which was the season before he began driving in the sport, it is highly unlikely that he will sit out two races. This means that he could potentially secure the title even sooner. In fact, he will likely do so before the season finale, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, for the second consecutive season.

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Vettel is still mathematically eligible to win the 2018 championship with five races to go because of the fact that a maximum of 25 points are on the table for each driver in each race — in fact, so are Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas and Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen.

This means that a maximum of 125 points are on the table for each driver throughout the course of the season’s final five races. Vettel trails Hamilton by 50 points. Bottas trails Hamilton by 117 points while Raikkonen trails him by 120 points, so while they are still mathematically eligible to win the championship, that will change soon. Vettel is the only other driver aside of Hamilton who still has a real chance to win the title.

With four races remaining in the season, a maximum of 100 points will be on the table for each driver throughout the rest of the season. This means that even if Hamilton wins the Japanese Grand Prix, which is this weekend’s race, and Vettel fails to score points, he is unable to mathematically clinch the championship after this race, as he would lead Vettel by 75 points.

However, Hamilton can mathematically clinch the championship after the 18th race of the season, the United States Grand Prix. After this race, three races will remain on the 2018 schedule, meaning that a maximum of 75 points will be on the table for each driver throughout the rest of the season.

Hamilton has won eight races so far this season while Vettel has won five, meaning that Vettel can still potentially win a tiebreaker with Hamilton if he ends up winning more races that Hamilton does. This, however, is unlikely.

If Hamilton can outscore Vettel by at least 25 points over the course of the Japanese Grand Prix and the United States Grand Prix and he has more than three more victories than Vettel does at this time, he will clinch the championship. If he does not have more than three more victories than Vettel does at this time, he will clinch the championship by outscoring Vettel by at least 26 points over the course of these two races.

If Hamilton cannot do this, he will simply need to score as many points as Vettel does over the course of the next three races, the third of which being the Mexican Grand Prix, and have more than two more victories than Vettel does after the Mexican Grand Prix to clinch the championship. If he does not have more than two victories than Vettel does at this time, he will need to outscore Vettel by at least one point over the course of the next three races to clinch the championship.

However, if Hamilton cannot pull this off, he will simply need to avoid being outscored by more than 25 points by Vettel over the course of the next four races, the fourth of which being the penultimate race of the season, the Brazilian Grand Prix, and have more than one more victory than Vettel does after the Brazilian Grand Prix to clinch the championship.

If Hamilton does not have more than one victory than Vettel does at this time, he will need to avoid being outscored by Vettel by more than 24 points over the course of the next four races to clinch the championship.

With all of this in mind, expect Hamilton to, at the very least, enter the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix at the end of November as a five-time Formula 1 champion. More than likely, he will secure his fifth career championship after either the United States Grand Prix or the Mexican Grand Prix, the latter being the race after which he secured his fourth career championship last season.

After which of the final five races of the 2018 Formula 1 season will Lewis Hamilton be crowned champion for the fifth time in his career? While it cannot happen after the Japanese Grand Prix this weekend, still be sure to tune in to ESPN2 for the live broadcast of this race from Suzuka Circuit. It is set to begin at 1:10 a.m. ET on Sunday, October 7.