Video: Rossi swaps rides with Lewis Hamilton

What would happen if the two swapped rides? It happened this week and video is now available of the two at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo, with Rossi in the 2017 Mercedes-AMG F1 W08 EQ Power+ car, and Hamilton aboard the 2019 YZR-M1. When Rossi and Hamilton want the track, I guess they get it.

Is anyone really shocked that champions of one motorsport are proficient at another? Both Rossi and Hamilton looked confident on their trial runs. Hamilton in particular looked very comfortable on two wheels.

“It was an exceptional day," said Lin Jarvis, Yamaha Motor Racing’s managing director. "To have Lewis together with us and Valentino, two icons of sport at the same time and place, was really amazing… I was very impressed by Lewis’ performance because how many four-wheel champions could come here and get on an M1, go out there, and do themselves proud? It’s very difficult to ride a motorcycle fast on track and even more challenging and demanding to ride a factory MotoGP bike.”

Only one man ever won both the Formula One and motorcycle grand prix world championship, the great John Surtees, and that accomplishment will likely never be repeated. In fact, Surtees had four premier-class motorcycle world championships to his name. Of course, VR46’s flirtations with Ferrari a decade ago never amounted to a career. Michael Schumacher was talking about moving to MotoGP around that same time. As for Hamilton, he has a good thing going in F1, so I don’t expect to see him trying out for a MotoGP team… ever. That’s not to say that these two legends looked any kind of slow out there.