Lewis Hamilton has walked into Charles Leclerc’s home by joining Ferrari and Gerhard Berger feels the Briton offers the Scuderia a ‘valuable’ boost the Monegasque cannot.
The Maranello crew dipped into the driver market last year as Hamilton agreed to break out of his contract at Mercedes early to join Ferrari. He only signed a deal with the Silver Arrows for 2024 and 2025 in August 2023 but agreed to leave before those terms had even started.
It made for a slightly awkward farewell tour last season, as Hamilton saw out the 2024 term with Mercedes before replacing Carlos Sainz at Ferrari once the Spaniard’s contract expired. But the Briton is now dressed in red and will partner Leclerc for, at least, the next two years.
Gerhard Berger backs rival F1 engineers to want to join Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari
Hamilton signed an initial two-season contract with Ferrari worth a base £39m a year, which also includes an option for 2027, having opted to leave Mercedes after back-to-back winless seasons. Ferrari even tied Leclerc down with a new deal through 2029 during January 2024.
Leclerc is very much a Ferrari man, having developed in the Scuderia’s driver academy after joining the FDA in 2016. Their backing even helped the 27-year-old debut in Formula 1 with Sauber in 2018, before Leclerc also traded places with Kimi Raikkonen in Maranello in 2019.
READ MORE: Seven best drives of Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes career ahead of Ferrari move
Yet despite him firmly being a part of the Scuderia family, plus Berger feeling Leclerc may be faster than Hamilton, the ex-Ferrari driver is convinced the Briton gives the Prancing Horse a ‘valuable’ boost as rival engineers want to work beside the seven-time F1 drivers’ champion.
Berger told Motor Sport Magazine: “[They have] two good drivers but Lewis has something that could be really quite valuable for Ferrari. He is a seven-time world champion.
“He will bring a lot of experience, a lot of momentum and maybe some guys will come from other teams to work with him. Engineers love to work with a guy who is seven times a champion.
“If he is successful, if he wins the championship, that will be the biggest thing ever in Formula 1. It doesn’t really matter if he is quicker than Leclerc or not, what matters is if he can bring enough points for another championship.”
Ferrari raided Mercedes for key technical staff but race engineer Peter Bonnington is not joining Lewis Hamilton
Ferrari moved hastily on the back of signing Hamilton to replace Sainz from the 2025 season to prise further figures away from Mercedes. Jerome d’Ambrosio, who was seen by many as Toto Wolff’s potential heir at the Silver Arrows, joined Ferrari as their deputy team principal.
Loic Serra also left Mercedes for Ferrari and took up the position of the Scuderia’s technical director of their chassis department last October reporting directly into team principal Fred Vasseur. Yet Mercedes were able to stop Hamilton from remaining tied to Peter Bonnington.
Mercedes promoted Hamilton’s long-time race engineer Bonnington to the role of the head of race engineering in Brackley. So, Ferrari and Hamilton agreed that Riccardo Adami will be his race engineer after acting in the role for Sebastian Vettel (2015-20) and Sainz (2021-24).
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