Lewis Hamilton Hoons Around With A Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 In Japan

Lewis Hamilton, 7-time Formula 1 world champion, recently took to social media and posted a video of him hooning about in perhaps one of the most iconic Japanese sportscars ever built through Japan. The car in question? A rather tasty-looking Nissan Skyline GT-R R34.

The highly edited video, which the 37-year-old Briton posted through his Instagram page, features several time-lapse sequences, bits of him talking inside the car, plus shots of him performing donuts and drifts in an empty street with the white-painted iconic Japanese sportscar.

What’s interesting too is the level of abuse said Nissan took at the hands of the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team driver as it included footage of smoke billowing out of the car’s transmission – literally through the shifter knob even.

“I only like to drive on track, but I make exceptions,” read the caption that accompanied the video Hamilton posted. This likely suggests the 7-time F1 world champion’s recognition of the cult-like reputation held by the Skyline GT-R R34 in which he thrashed about through (presumably) Tokyo.

In case you’re not familiar, the Nissan Skyline GT-R R34, also known as ‘Godzilla’ amongst its legion of fans, is widely regarded as a performance car icon. Based on the fifth generation (R34) Nissan Skyline coupe, it packed a manic 2.6-litre twin-turbo straight-six heart that output anywhere between 276 HP and 330 HP.

Said peppy heart came paired with a trick all-wheel-drive (AWD) system, which granted the R34-generation GT-R unprecedented traction and handling. It was also the last Skyline-based GT-R model Nissan made before switching to a stand-alone GT-R replacement later.

You can check out the video for yourself below and see what it was like for Hamilton during his, shall we say ‘spirited’, shakedown and test-drive of the iconic JDM sports coupe…