F1 has made me a safer driver, says Damson Idris
Damson Idris has revealed how F1 has changed his approach to driving.
Damson Idris has become "a lot safer" on the road since starring in F1.
The 33-year-old actor plays a Formula One driver in the new motorsport movie, and Damson has revealed how starring in the film has changed his own approach to driving.
Damson - who appears in the film alongside Brad Pitt - told People: "I'm not going to lie, it actually made me drive a lot safer."
The actor has also developed a new level of "respect" for Formula One drivers, observing that they handle a lot of risk during races.
He said: "I have so much respect for Formula One drivers and the speeds that they reach and the amount of pressure that they're under while they reach those speeds."
Damson drove up to 180 miles per hour while shooting scenes for the movie. But he's now much more cautious behind the wheel of his own car.
The London-born actor shared: "Now when I'm in the car, I'm definitely just cruising and minding my business."
Sir Lewis Hamilton actually served as a co-producer on F1, and the seven-time Formula One champion recently revealed that he "loved" working on the movie.
He told Extra: "I love how it all came out.
"It's been like four years we've been working on it, so it's been a long, long road.
"I’ve never been a part creating a movie from the first treatment to working on the script to working on the characters to watching all the different videotapes of the actors doing their scenes."
Lewis also relished working with the film's cast and crew.
He said: "We really brought on the best cast. The cast has been incredible … The crew in the background who made this movie what it is today, I'm so grateful to them."
Lewis, 40, actually got to take Brad on a racing track at one point, as part of his preparations for the movie. And the former world champion relished the experience of spending time with Brad.
He shared: "I got to take Brad out for the first time a couple years ago on a track and then I said, ‘Show me what you can do.’ And he took me out on a lap and straight away I could see he was already a bit of a racing driver … I wasn’t scared for him."
By contrast, Damson was far less comfortable on a race track.
However, Lewis noted that Damson ultimately did "an amazing job" during the action scenes.
Lewis recalled: "I was a little bit scared, because I don't think Damson grew up watching ... like, black families don't grow up watching racing … I think he probably was thrown in the deep end, but he did such an amazing job."
