The start of Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari career has been slightly underwhelming after struggling to a tenth-place finish at the Australian Grand Prix.
Ferrari adopted a bold strategy in the rain which didn’t pay off and left both drivers at the bottom end of the top 10.
The Australian Grand Prix weekend was a very useful experience for Hamilton, who now has further vital laps under his belt in the new car.
Charles Leclerc out-qualified the Brit and scored more points than him, but they seemed fairly close on pace throughout the weekend.
Hamilton has one obvious area of improvement at Ferrari and needs to improve his communication with new race engineer Riccardo Adami.
It didn’t have an effect on him during the last lap though as he was overtaken by McLaren’s Oscar Piastri. Martin Burndle thinks Hamilton won’t like watching it back after the young Aussie outclassed him.
READ MORE: Martin Brundle completely disagrees with one thing Ferrari have just said about Lewis Hamilton’s Australian Grand Prix debut
Lewis Hamilton has made corner approach ‘adjustment’ at Ferrari he was afraid of at Mercedes
Although he’s hunting a record eighth drivers’ championship, Hamilton is not expected to win straight away.
Currently, Ferrari may be the fourth-fastest team and have a lot of work to do after the first race of the 2025 Formula 1 campaign.
Scott Mitchell-Malm saw positive signs from the Brit in Melbourne and thinks that he made one change he wouldn’t have done at Mercedes.
“The left-hander, the one that Antonelli and Russell spun at he would lift early, lift a little bit more than Leclerc into there and get a better exit at [turns] nine and 10 quite consistently, he was trading off a little bit of entry speed at nine and then a better run through 10 and all the way down to 11,” he said.
“There were definitely signs that Hamilton was making an adjustment in the Ferrari that he never seemed to either be able to make or want to make with the last couple of Mercedes cars that he drove. He can’t quite do the magic Leclerc brake/throttle overlap.
“He might not need to. I think there were enough signs that can be quick in this car. I think the bigger question mark at the moment is just how quick that car is going to be overall.”
READ MORE: Lewis Hamilton sends message to Ferrari fans after ‘rollercoaster’ Australian Grand Prix debut, ‘a lot of work to do…’
Why Peter Windsor thinks Lewis Hamilton suffered an ’embarrassing’ Australian Grand Prix
After picking up one singular point for 10th place, the result looks fairly poor on the outside without taking any of the external factors into account.
The weather (first time driving a Ferrari in the wet), the debut race in red and the pressure of driving for a new team all played a role in Hamilton’s Melbourne performance.
Despite the factors at play, Peter Windsor thinks Hamilton’s performance was ’embarrassing’ and expected more from the seven-time champion.
At one stage he led the race after the team opted to leave him on slick tyres when it began to rain. His result wasn’t entirely his fault.
Ferrari’s car usually goes well at the Japanese Grand Prix, so the upcoming race should be an opportunity for him to build on his first performance.
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