Karun Chandhok thinks Lewis Hamilton now faces a ‘critical’ turning point at Ferrari after ‘woeful’ Spain weekend

Lewis Hamilton looked like he would rather be anywhere else but the Circuit de Catalunya after Sunday’s race.

The Spanish Grand Prix has treated Lewis Hamilton very well over the years.

Ferrari’s newest star has won in Barcelona on six occasions, a record only matched by Michael Schumacher.

Hamilton outqualified Charles Leclerc for only the second time this season going into Sunday’s race.

However, Leclerc sacrificed his final qualifying run to benefit his race strategy and it paid off perfectly.

The Monegasque driver finished on the podium after Max Verstappen’s three-stop strategy was ruined by a late safety car.

By this point of the race, Hamilton had already moved out of the way for Leclerc and was struggling to hang onto P5.

Nico Hulkenberg made his way past the seven-time world champion before the end of the race and Hamilton was understandably despondent during his post-race interviews.

Karun Chandhok has analysed Hamilton’s ninth Grand Prix start for the Scuderia and thinks his engineers might be becoming increasingly concerned with what they’re seeing this season.

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Lewis Hamilton facing ‘critical’ Ferrari moment after ‘woeful’ Spanish Grand Prix

Chandhok was speaking on The F1 Show and reflecting on Hamilton’s latest sixth-place finish this season.

He said: “I think it’s starting to get a bit critical. We’re coming into the second third of the season now and he’s not finding the rhythm.

“He’s not finding the consistency where week in, week out, he’s in a happy place with the car.

“Imola, woeful in qualifying, suddenly, the car’s brilliant in the race.

“Monaco, he wasn’t quite there, he was a chunk behind Charles throughout.

“I think there’s got to be a degree of concern creeping in. When you look at the race, the fact that Charles overtook him and drove away from him quite comfortably, even before we go into the different tyres and stuff later on.

“I’d be concerned if I was Lewis if I was on the Lewis side of the garage, engineers, etc. I’d be concerned about, OK, we’re nearly halfway through the year now.

“We need to start understanding if this a fundamental issue that we need to change the direction of the setup of the car.

“I’m not disputing the fact that he’s still got the ability, he clearly does. He’s able to win races, we saw in China, right?

“But they need to find a sweet spot for him that every weekend he knows what he’s got and they haven’t got that.

“He’s still having too many good days and bad days. It’s like the fluctuations are too much.”

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Lewis Hamilton making changes at Ferrari which might explain his difficult start to 2025

As Chandhok explains, there’s no doubt that Hamilton is still more than capable of winning races.

However, his adaptation period is taking longer than he would like and the demands on Formula 1 drivers these days mean that Ferrari can’t afford to wait forever for him to rediscover what has made him statistically the best racer in Formula 1 history.

Hamilton has made a ‘very uncomfortable’ change this year to try and adapt his driving style to the SF-25.

He’s getting used to a new power unit, brakes and a host of other procedural changes.

His race engineer Riccardo Adami is still getting to grips with communicating effectively with Hamilton.

After working so effectively alongside Peter Bonnington last season, it’s another important change the 40-year-old is getting used to.

This season may soon need to be considered a warm-up for Hamilton ahead of the changing rule set in 2026.

That might present Hamilton with his best and possibly final opportunity to add an eighth world championship to his collection.