Brembo is continuing work to get Lewis Hamilton comfortable with the brakes which they supply to Ferrari.
That is the reveal made by the Italian firm’s F1 customer manager Andrea Algeri, Hamilton having had a mixed start to life as a Ferrari driver.
Brembo trying to get Lewis Hamilton in braking ‘comfort zone’
A lot of things changed for the seven-time World Champion when he moved from Mercedes to Ferrari. On top of stepping into a totally new culture, and moving away from the Mercedes engine for the first time in his F1 career, Hamilton also needed to adapt to new brakes.
It was Carbon Industrie brakes for Hamilton all the way at Mercedes, and the adaptation to Brembo brakes – plus Ferrari life in general – has been challenging.
Hamilton spoke of a “new component” contributing to a Belgian GP Sprint qualifying spin. It later emerged that Hamilton was using a new combination of Brembo brake materials – including discs and pads – at Spa-Francorchamps, potentially explaining his comment.
Algeri confirmed that Brembo are hard at work trying to help Hamilton – following his “complaints” – with his adaptation.
“It was very exciting to start to work with Lewis,” Algeri told The Race.
“Obviously, we had some complaints from him within our regular communication and so on, and we are working hard to try to put him in a comfort zone in terms of braking.
“We know he was used to a different material first, but also a different set-up in terms of general braking of the car that are not only the brakes themselves, but also engine braking, energy recovery and so on.
“So we have been pushing a lot from the team, and we are working hard to try to solve the situation and to have the best result from him.
“On top of that, Ferrari is obviously pushing to be in front, and as usual, is one of the teams that gave us the right pressure to go ahead. We are happy to do it. It’s challenging.
“Obviously, I’m not hiding myself. It’s challenging because it’s really an important job that we are doing, but it is also the way we get to improve our product.”
Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc head-to-head in F1 2025
👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates
👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates
Algeri added that Brembo takes a “different approach” to Carbon Industrie, whereby the Italian firm looks for more stable performance “across different temperatures”, with a very low rate of wear.
“This is the way we design the material. Some of the drivers appreciate it. Some others are a bit, let’s say, used to other things,” Algeri concluded.
Read next: Lewis Hamilton releases new statement ahead of Dutch Grand Prix