Eddie Jordan defended his warning to Lewis Hamilton against the Ferrari move despite claiming fierce backlash.

The 2024 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix marked the final race for Lewis Hamilton as a Mercedes driver ahead of his blockbuster switch to Ferrari, a race where he was able to ensure that his troubling road to the finish line with Mercedes ended on a high.

Eddie Jordan delves into Lewis Hamilton psychological state

But it was in Qatar – where Hamilton experienced arguably his lowest low of F1 2024 – where he said he was “definitely not fast anymore” after a fresh qualifying defeat to George Russell, their head-to-head battle for the season finishing at 19-5 in Russell’s favour.

And Jordan had warned Hamilton that he is “f***ed” if he goes to Ferrari with that mentality.

“If you don’t believe 100 per cent, you’re f**ked. Do you understand that?” Jordan said on the Formula For Success podcast.

“Because belief, 99.9 per cent, means that there is that tiny, little, little thing in there knocking on your head that gives you the things that maybe, ‘Oh, I don’t really have that confidence. I don’t really have the ability’.

“And at the moment what I heard from Lewis, I’m not fast enough anymore, they were the words, I think.

“Honestly, if I was Ferrari, I would say close the book, find the way out. That’s it.”

Jordan said he was not short of fierce responses to those words, but stands by his concerns, which mean he cannot confidently at this stage predict Hamilton and Ferrari will be a successful F1 2025 partnership.

“Oh, my God, I got such s*** over me saying that I thought Lewis should not be going to Ferrari because of what he said,” said Jordan on the latest episode of the podcast where he spoke alongside 13-time grand prix winner David Coulthard. “And when people say things like, ‘I don’t think I’m fast enough anymore’, I mean, that registers in my head.

“Psychologically, I’m such a person, yes I believe in talent, yes I believe in performance, and yes, I believe in speed, but I’m a psychological person. I like to know what’s going on inside that brain.

“Because I think fundamentally, what’s going on in there very often gets replicated back in the job or the issues that you’re doing, and whether that’s driving a car, a truck, a train, a crane, it doesn’t matter. It’s how you approach the moment.

“And do I think, that this time next year, if we’re both happy, and if the podcast survives that length, and I survive that length, we will all say, ‘Jesus, Lewis was amazing!’? Now, I hope I’m able to say that, but at the moment, I have to say that [Charles] Leclerc is quick.”

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That being said, Jordan is not ruling out a revitalised Hamilton pushing for his record-breaking eighth World Championship next season.

“Lewis could do it,” said Jordan. “If Lewis could remember when he left McLaren and he went to Mercedes…

“God rest him, but Niki Lauda [three-time World Champion and former Mercedes non-executive chairman] and I, he used to push me into McLaren to go and speak to Lewis, to do all the little messaging for him, because he couldn’t do it, because of the connection… He was so strongly involved with Mercedes.

“Now, you know, it’s meteoric what he did at Mercedes, so who’s to say that he’s not going to find a new Lewis Hamilton inside his helmet and inside his suit? And he also could be up there.

“That’s the intriguing thing about ’25, because I think it has untold possibilities, and that’s why it’s going to be so good.”

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