Lewis Hamilton will have to rebuild his confidence when he joins Ferrari at the start of 2025. It’s been repeatedly dented in a difficult final season with Mercedes.
In truth, Hamilton hasn’t looked like the same driver since the notorious 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, when he lost out on an eighth world championship to Max Verstappen. That psychological blow, along with the shift to ground-effect cars, seems to have hurt him.
The current generation of machines don’t suit Hamilton’s driving style. George Russell immediately beat him in 2022 after joining from Williams, though the veteran had the edge in qualifying.
Last season, Hamilton struck back by finishing nearly 60 points ahead of Russell. But in 2024, he’s lagging behind on both Saturday and Sunday.
Russell has dominated the qualifying head-to-head in alarming fashion, carrying a 16-5 lead into this weekend’s Las Vegas Grand Prix. Charles Leclerc, Hamilton’s next teammate, is seen by some as the fastest F1 driver over a single lap.
What’s more, Hamilton has only finished ahead of his teammate six times in the races this year. Despite that, Russell is only two points ahead before the season-ending triple-header.
Ferrari must stop Lewis Hamilton ‘experimenting’ with their car in 2025
Speaking on Formule1.nl’s Paddockpraat podcast, former F1 engineer Ernest Knoors said Hamilton had a ‘tendency’ to turn his ‘whole car upside down’ if he’s struggling for performance. Ferrari must be wary.
While they will naturally defer to a ‘big personality’ in Hamilton, they must also offer guidance and prevent him from ‘experimenting’ to an excessive degree. Without sufficient caution, their season could go ‘completely wrong’.
Knoors doubts whether Hamilton will be able to extract more from the car than predecessor Carlos Sainz. He suspects Ferrari have signed him largely for marketing purposes.
“I see Lewis Hamilton’s arrival at Ferrari more as a PR move,” he said. “With all due respect, Hamilton is not going to take that Ferrari from P6 to P1. He will get the most out of it, but what Ferrari has to do is make that car faster. And if you make that car faster, you can easily drive at the front with the current line-up.”
“A big name like Hamilton also brings a lot of politics. And if politics within Ferrari are not managed well, then there is a lot of potential for drama.
“Hamilton has the tendency that if things don’t work out, he turns his whole car upside down and starts experimenting. Ferrari believes very much in the big personalities and will follow him.
“But Hamilton is just someone you have to guide a little bit and not give the freedom to rebuild the whole car. Because then it will go completely wrong.”
How radical Mercedes experiments have hurt Lewis Hamilton this year
Hamilton has rarely looked comfortable behind the wheel in 2024. He’s responsible for two of Mercedes’ three race wins, but the optimism arising from those highs has been short-lived.
That’s because the car has an extremely narrow working window. Veer too far from it, and it becomes bordeline undriveable in places – Hamilton’s onboard made for ‘awful’ viewing in Brazil.
| CATEGORY | HAM | RUS |
| Points | 190 | 192 |
| Wins | 2 | 1 |
| Poles | 0 | 2 |
| Podiums | 4 | 3 |
| Qualified ahead | 5 | 16 |
| Finished ahead | 6 | 12 |
Hamilton has been experimenting for three seasons to try and find a solution that works consistently. Those efforts have been unsuccessful, and perhaps actively damaging.
Because he’s been changing his set-up so frequently, the 39-year-old finds it ‘harder to know the car’s limit’. That may explain why he’s been so poor in Q3 this year, when the drivers push hardest of all.
