TV and rap star Drake has lost $230,000 after betting that Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc would go won to take victory in the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona in the last round of the Formula One season.
The Canadian rapper, 35, placed his first ever Formula 1 bet on the cryptocurrency platform Stake, stumping up CA$300,000 on the Ferrari driver, who started the Barcelona race from first position after a great final lap in the qualifying session on Saturday. Charles had a good start and led for the first 27 laps, looking set to take the race wins with a comfortable gap to his Red Bull rivals, but the Ferrari driver had to stop the car due to a power unit issue which forced him to retire.
Drake posted a screenshot of his bet on his Instagram Stories, showing he had deposited CA$300,000 in the hope of winning CA$750,000 (US$590,000).
He wrote: ‘First F1 bet, let’s see how it goes.’
Drake has a partnership with the crypto firm Stake where he hosts exclusive live-streams. He also won an estimated $2million in Bitcoin in bets on this year’s Super Bowl.
After the Formula 1 Spanish Grand Prix, F1 fans joked that the so-called ‘Drake curse’, which has seen teams and individual athletes lose after he publicly backed them, has now plagued Ferrari and Charles Leclerc in Barcelona.
It started when the Toronto Raptors, Drake’s hometown basketball team, made him their global ambassador in almost ten years ago and went on to gain a reputation for choking in big games. Two years later Serena Williams suffered a surprise defeat to Roberta Vinci in the semi-finals of the US Open shortly after meeting the Canadian TV and rap star
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UFC champion Conor McGregor was another favourite to fall victim to the Drake curse as he lost against Khabib Nurmagomedov. Boxer Anthony Joshua even joked before his ill-fated fight with Andy Ruiz Jr that he would ‘defeat the curse’ shortly after meeting the superstar rapper.
Drake has previously been seen in the company for Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton who was close to finishing fourth in the Spanish Grand Prix, but was overtaken by Carlos Sainz on the last lap due to a late engine problem.
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