1 Year After Lewis Hamilton Split, Angela Cullen Guns for IndyCar Driver to Follow in 7x Champ’s Footsteps
Can Angela Cullen Replicate Her Magic With An IndyCar Driver Like She Did With Lewis Hamilton?
Angela Cullen leaving Lewis Hamilton‘s side in 2023 saddened his fans. The New Zealand physiotherapist spent 7 years ensuring the Mercedes driver stays in peak condition for F1, aiding him to 4 consecutive championships from 2017 to 2020. Their heartbreaking split came during Mercedes’ worst period in recent times, but there was no bad blood. But now that she is back in motorsport as “more than a physio” for IndyCar’s Marcus Armstrong, is a new Hamilton in the making?
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The 7-time champion labeled Cullen a “healer” after her IndyCar announcement earlier this year. “She’s a positive person. Her purpose is to bring love to everyone that she meets, and what she does,” he added. Cullen’s year-long hiatus, where she lived life to its fullest, came a breath of fresh air from F1’s constantly traveling circus. But what she thought of as ‘retirement’ turned into a second career quickly. She connected with her 24-year-old compatriot Marcus Armstrong, who drives for Chip Ganassi Racing in IndyCar. Soon, the mental coaching drew her back into motorsport, and a new dream was born.
In 2023, the New Zealand racer won Rookie of the Year, and things looked up. Though 2024 has been relatively disappointing, with P14 as his current standing, Cullen aims to overturn the situation. “Like all great athletes, the thing that makes them different is their focus and their dedication and their belief that they have this true purpose which is to be the best,” she told IndyCar about her view on great athletes. “You’ll find that across all sports they sacrifice everything for this one dream and it’s so inspiring to work with these people and help them achieve that.”
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Diving into her relationship with Armstrong, she said, “We’ve only been working together maybe three months. So the way I coach is very much about getting to know them as a person and then helping facilitate how I can help them. We’re probably still in the infancy stage, sort of navigating how that’s going to work in the future.”
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Angela Cullen‘s experience spread across a multitude of sports. She worked with the UK Olympic team, coaching the 100 and 200-meter sprinters, which she described as the “F1 of athletics.” Though the Hintsa performance coach describes her Armstrong partnership as being in an “infancy” stage, the young racer disagrees.
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Marcus Armstrong cannot imagine racing without Angela Cullen
Having spent over half a decade in F1, Cullen didn’t imagine returning to motorsport. Marcus Armstrong felt the same, assuming she’d take a break. But when they interacted in 2023, they completely hit it off. Though their professional partnership only materialized this year, the 24-year-old considers her pivotal to his life. He also counts on her experience with Mercedes to overhaul his wonky 2024 performance.
“She has all the experience in the world,” Armstrong told AP news. “She’s seen championships won. She’s seen how it’s done by Mercedes and all of that. So having her on board is a source of inspiration and guidance and motivation. We’ve been working together not that long and I don’t even know how I managed races without her,” he surprisingly added.
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via Reuters
The New Zealander refers to her presence as being ‘more than a physio’. Including her stint with Lewis Hamilton, Cullen has 25 years of experience under her belt. The day might not be far when Armstrong and Chip Ganassi Racing turn into the Mercedes of IndyCar and challenge Arrow McLaren for podiums. Furthermore, IndyCar wouldn’t even induce F1-like fatigue. Unlike the pinnacle of motorsport’s global adventures, IndyCar only travels within North America. This would help her boost longevity and have a better balance. But if Marcus Armstrong can conquer his sport’s peaks like Lewis Hamilton in F1 remains to be seen.
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Written By
Yash Kotak
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Yash is an F1 writer at EssentiallySports. He blends his passion for writing and love for Formula 1 by writing captivating stories that our readers find engaging and insightful. He found the intriguingly complex world of Formula 1 when he watched the ‘INSIDE TRACKS’ episode covering the 2018 German Grand Prix.
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Sanchari Bhaduri
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