Who is Lewis Hamilton: 13 need-to-know facts I bet you didn't know (and couldn't care less)

1. He has three Blue Peter badges.

2. Hamilton first went on the programme as a remote-control car driver aged six ('Is it easy to do?' asked John Leslie; 'No,' deadpanned mini-Lewis), then as a go-kart driver at 12, and finally a Formula A driver at 16.

3. His favourite bands are Chaka Demus & Pliers, Natasha Bedingfield, Oasis, 50 Cent and real-life chums P Diddy and Pharrell Williams. He's not so sure about Kiss.

4. He eats Sugar Puffs with added sugar.

5. Ron Dennis has promised him a McLaren F1 LM. There are only six of these 240mph road cars in existence and the McLaren boss has said Hamilton can have one if he wins two world titles by the end of 2009.

6. The song 'I Think I'm in Love' on the Pussycat Dolls' latest album was written about Hamilton by girlfriend, and lead Doll, Nicole Scherzinger. She follows previous girlfriends Jodia Ma, his school sweetheart, and Vivian Burkhardt, Miss Grenada.

7. Entirely unconnected, he is said to be buying a luxury £10m hotel in Grenada, to go with his pad on the shores of Lake Geneva.

8. It took 27 takes to get that shot of Hamilton's head being fixed on to his body in the Abbey bank advert where he appears as a plastic Airfix-style model. ('My life is very strange,' he said.)

9. His favourite restaurant is Shanghai Blues, a posh Chinese in London's Holborn with a private karaoke room in which Hamilton has been known to croon.

10. Contrary to belief, he won't do absolutely anything for a sponsor. 'For sure if I had to wear some strange Borat crazy suit, I wouldn't be doing that,' he said after one of the worst PR stunts in memory, when he flew on to a stage in Istanbul in May as the god Apollo, for McLaren team backer Vodafone.

11. He is a Christian and wears a cross during races. 'I am a true believer and I truly believe that I have been blessed,' he says.

12. He keeps his helmet on during training, even wearing it at night with weights stacked atop it to increase his neck-strength.

13.1. Hamilton paid £200,000 for the licence plate LEW 1S in June.

13.2. His greatest fear is "a-groundhog-day"; being beaten by Ferrari in Brazil... again!

L3wi5 Hamiltoff's NOTE> OK, I MADE THAT LAST ONE UP, IT SHOULD BE... eaten alive by a great white shark.

SOURCE: GUARDIAN