The idiots are winning

Lewis Hamilton has been abused again by ‘racist f**kheads’ (our term).

The world champion was called a ‘monkey’ and a ’space chimp’ on Spanish newspaper 20 Minutos’s website.

The comments were submitted after the rumour about Hamilton’s plans to fly into space with Virgin Galactic - a story that McLaren’s press office tells us is absolutely untrue - was reported online by 20 Minutos.

Lewis targeted online

Not for the first time, racists have targeted Lewis Hamilton. So-called fans of Fernando Alonso - not all of them support Alonso - left abusive messages on a Spanish website called Pincha la Rueda de Hamilton, or “Burst Hamilton’s Tyre”. Visitors can drop virtual nails, tacks or porcupines (yes, porcupines) on a computerised version of the Interlagos track, hoping Hamilton “suffers a puncture”.

So what, you might say - it’s a bit of fun. But it’s the abusive comments left on the site that have inevitably made the headlines. We won’t repeat them here, but you can imagine the type of anti-Lewis bile that some visitors to the site have spouted.

“Everyone in our sport will join us in condemning these abusive and hateful comments,” said an FIA spokesman in a statement that McLaren later agreed with. McLaren also admitted that their driver is “vaguely aware” of the website and offensive comments.