Juan Pablo Montoya urges Lewis Hamilton to demand drastic Ferrari change Martin Brundle is totally against

Lewis Hamilton is struggling to find performance at Ferrari in 2025. He is yet to score a podium after the first eight races of the season.

Besides grabbing two podiums in Sprint races in Shanghai and Miami, winning the former, Hamilton has offered little competition to the frontrunners. The 40-year-old is finding it difficult to adapt to the SF-25 and his new environment in Maranello.

The Spanish Grand Prix presents an opportunity for the team, as Ferrari hope the FIA’s flexi-wing directive will shake up the pecking order. But this has made little difference for Hamilton thus far as Charles Leclerc is ‘considerably ahead’, with the Brit struggling with an unstable rear end.

Hamilton was ‘tough’ to interview in Barcelona as he and Leclerc did not give ‘imminent’ answers about Ferrari’s woes. Poor decision-making from the pit wall and miscommunication over the radio have been costly for the Maranello outfit in 2025.

Hamilton is working hard to improve communication with his race engineer Riccardo Adami, but the Monaco GP highlighted how big of a problem it is proving to be. The Italian did not give his driver enough information during the race, completely ignoring the 40-year-old at one point.

Juan Pablo Montoya urges Lewis Hamilton to change his Ferrari engineers

With the team 177 points behind McLaren heading into the Spanish GP and Hamilton sixth in the standings, Martin Brundle urged Ferrari not to resort to sackings to change their fortunes.

However, Juan Pablo Montoya wants to see Hamilton make a change behind the scenes after watching his struggles in Monaco. Speaking via AS Colombia, the former F1 driver says the seven-time champion needs to ‘get angry’ and change his engineers.

“I don’t think I’m in on it, but it sounds like: ‘Look, your teammate can drive it’ That’s the problem, that’s it,” said Montoya.

“That happens a lot, and at some point, I don’t know what happened after the race, but at some point, Lewis is going to have to get angry and suddenly ask for a change of engineers or something.

“Because if he makes a change of engineers, it would be good for the people around him to say: ‘Do I work with Lewis or will he take me out?’

“And that’s what Lewis suddenly needs at this point, because the engineer, the attitude of not answering the radio, you have to be more professional than that and a person like that isn’t healthy for him, [the] team, it’s not healthy for anyone personally.

“If I were with Ferrari, I would have pulled his ears, [the] engineer, and said: ‘You do that again, and you’ll be working at a desk in the office because we’re still not interested in people like you, do you understand?”

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Why is Lewis Hamilton struggling so much at Ferrari?

Many people have speculated why the Brit is having so much trouble at Ferrari. The SF-25 is proving to be a difficult car to handle in 2025.

Hamilton is suffering from a ‘chronic lack of confidence’ in the front end of the car. The flexi-wing directive in Barcelona seems to be having little effect, as the seven-time champion is struggling to find the right balance.

Many have also wondered if the 40-year-old’s age is a problem. Hamilton had his worst season in F1 in 2024, with people beginning to question whether he has the ability to compete at the front anymore.

Ralf Schumacher does not think Hamilton’s age is a problem, stating he can only do so much when he is unhappy with the car.

However, the Brit’s former Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg disagrees with Schumacher, claiming that age is the ‘ultimate’ issue for Hamilton. The 2016 champion has questioned whether that age has come into the equation as Leclerc gains the upper hand at Ferrari.