Lewis Hamilton only has to wait a few more weeks until he can jump into Ferrari’s 2025 Formula 1 car for the very first time.
Ferrari are set to launch this year’s machine a day after the F1 75 event being held in London where their latest livery will be revealed.
While fans will be excited about how the car is going to look, they’ll be much more interested in how fast Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc are going to be this year.
Team principal Frederic Vasseur will hope that he’s finally created the right combination of drivers and key staff to end the team’s 17-year wait for a championship.
The last time the Drivers’ Championship was won by a Ferrari driver, Kimi Raikkonen denied Hamilton and Fernando Alonso on the final day of the 2007 season.
Although Hamilton’s main priority will be what happens on the track, there are a lot more aspects to being a Formula 1 driver as he will know all too well.
Journalist Ben Anderson was speaking on The Race F1’s Patreon about Hamilton’s upcoming debut season with the Scuderia.
While he thinks that Hamilton is well equipped to deal with anything that driving for Ferrari drives for him, the media scrutiny is something the 40-year-old is unlikely to enjoy.
Lewis Hamilton unlikely to ‘enjoy’ media scrutiny at Ferrari
Talking about how Hamilton’s relationship with the media might change now he’s joined Ferrari, Anderson said: “We’ve gotten used to Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc both being quite outspoken in the media about the limitations [of Ferrari’s cars], Sainz, especially in the last couple of seasons.
“So, I think the culture there is different. I imagine they’re even more critical behind the scenes and that’s how you improve, right? Fred Vasseur knows that better than anyone else as a guy steeped in motorsport, engineering and success.
“As for Hamilton’s vulnerability to the volatile culture, I don’t think that’s going to be a problem for him.
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“Simply because of his age and experience. There’s not much in F1 apart from being at Ferrari that he hasn’t experienced.
“And yes OK there’s a lot of media scrutiny, but to be honest, Hamilton’s his own version of that.
“He’s spoken about how he almost can’t win whatever he does in F1 now because he’s so successful, so scrutinised, unique in who he is and what he’s achieved. That just follows him around.
“I don’t think he’ll enjoy that aspect but I think he’s well used to dealing with it.”
Lewis Hamilton has already surprised the Italian media at Ferrari
No team is under more pressure when it comes to the media than Ferrari, with expectations always exceedingly high.
Leclerc has always dealt with this pressure well, although it could be argued that he’s never been in a position where he’s been expected to win a championship and if that changes, it’s yet to be seen whether he’ll cope with having to be faultless up against Hamilton or the likes of Max Verstappen.
Hamilton, on the other hand, has dealt with this ever since his F1 debut in 2007 when he was regarded as one of the strongest rookies to grace the sport in recent memory.
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He silenced many of his critics by nearly winning the title in his rookie season before going on to clinch the championship the following year.
Hamilton has already surprised the Italian media during his short time at Ferrari and they’ll be hoping he can end their long wait to celebrate an Italian team winning the championship.
However, the pressure will quickly grow if he’s not on the same level as Leclerc at the start of the year.
