Lewis favourite to win BBC gong, but does he deserve it?

Lewis Hamilton was favourite to win last year’s BBC Sports Personality of the Year, despite throwing away the world title in his first season in F1. In the end Lewis lost out to Joe Calzaghe, a boxer from Wales who is yet to taste defeat. So, two agonising second places in one year for Lewis - although losing out on the drivers’ title was, we imagine, slightly more galling than losing out to Calzaghe (and at least he didn’t lose out to Zara Phillips).

This time around, with the world title tucked into his racing overalls, Lewis is an even stronger favourite to win the Beeb’s annual award. But there is even stiffer competition in 2008, in the form of several gold medal-winning Olympians from Beijing (Chris Hoy and Rebecca Adlington offer the biggest threat), not to mention tennis star Andy Murray, who has had a fine year (see the full short-list here).

Does Lewis deserve to win the award? Does he have more personality than a daffy blonde swimmer or a dour Scottish tennis player? What constitutes personality anyway? So many questions, which you can answer by leaving a witty comment. If you can’t be arsed to leave a comment, you can just vote…

Which driver failed to deliver in 2008? You decide…

After many of you - including 98% of Poland’s population - voted in our Driver of the Season poll, we have to ask you: who was the biggest flop of 2008? Kimi Raikkonen perhaps, or crash-happy David Coulthard?

Vote below:

What’s the best possible driver partnership in F1 right now?

In F1, driver pairings do matter. And it’s not quite as simple as putting the best two drivers on the grid in the same car. It’s all very well having two great drivers but if the chemistry isn’t there it can be costly.

We already know that Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton don’t go together - in fact, Ron Dennis’s masterplan to team them up probably cost McLaren a driver’s title in 2007. Alonso ended up being the spanner in the works - some of that was his fault, but McLaren should have realised that a double former world champ might want top billing within a team.