{"id":45240,"date":"2025-08-05T09:03:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T09:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/45240\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T09:03:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T09:03:11","slug":"ferrari-and-hamilton-thought-they-were-perfect-for-each-other-that-honeymoon-is-over","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/45240\/","title":{"rendered":"Ferrari and Hamilton Thought They Were Perfect for Each Other. That Honeymoon Is Over"},"content":{"rendered":"

Get The Drive\u2019s daily newsletter<\/p>\n

The latest car news, reviews, and features.<\/p>\n

When Lewis Hamilton<\/a> announced he would be leaving Mercedes after 12 seasons in favor of a shot at bringing a championship title to Ferrari, the pair were quickly and loudly dubbed the strongest driver-team duo in Formula 1<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For a storied team like Ferrari\u2014shackled by an 18-year World Drivers\u2019 Championship drought\u2014the news that the seven-time champ would join the team<\/a> brought with it an inauguration-like reception. A year before Italy would appoint a new pope, the nation had found faith in a 40-year-old race car driver turning in his Silver Arrow for Rosso Corsa.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the celebrations soured swiftly. Halfway through the 2025 F1 season, Hamilton sits in sixth place in the driver standings behind his former teammate George Russell, who sits pretty in fourth, and his current teammate, Charles Leclerc, who is now fifth. Italy\u2019s other hope for the future\u201418-year-old Bologna-born wunderkind Kimi Antonelli\u2014and Hamilton\u2019s replacement at Mercedes trails just behind him in seventh.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Lewis<\/p>\n

\"Lewis
\nGetty<\/p>\n

While the spring brought the promise of speed, including a sprint win in China<\/a> and a sprint podium in Miami, the first half of the season has been a rude awakening. Throughout the first 14 races of 2025, Hamilton\u2019s once-optimistic view of Ferrari has been tested. Ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix, he said he refuses to not win a championship with the team like former Ferrari drivers Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at the team over the last 20 years, they\u2019ve had amazing drivers: Kimi [Raikkonen], Fernando [Alonso], Sebastian [Vettel]\u2014all world champions. However, they didn\u2019t win a world championship [at Ferrari]. And for me, I refuse for that to be the case with me.\u201d (Raikkonen did win a title with Ferrari in 2007.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, an 18th-place sprint qualifying position and a 16th-place starting grid place in the feature race in Spa chipped away at Hamilton\u2019s confidence. By Saturday\u2019s Hungarian Grand Prix qualifying session\u2014where he failed to make it into Q3 while Leclerc took pole position\u2014his resolve had all but disintegrated.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI am useless. Absolutely useless,\u201d he said. \u201cThe team has no problem. You can see [Leclerc\u2019s] car is on pole. They probably need to change drivers.\u201d The dramatic response echoed Hamilton\u2019s comments in April when he said the team bosses were \u201cnot happy\u201d with his performance and that he needed a \u201cbrain transplant\u201d to adapt to the Ferrari SF-25.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"LewisGetty NurPhoto<\/p>\n

The prestigious title of \u201cFerrari driver,\u201d Hamilton has discovered, means taming something wild. The prancing horse turns out to be less of a polished, well-groomed show horse and more of a mustang, bucking off even the most experienced of drivers. In a sport full of adrenaline junkies, that is part of the appeal: to achieve what few have done before. To tighten the reins and win a championship with the temperamental beast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But to do so requires upending a systemic culture of mistakes and missteps.\u00a0<\/p>\n

During the mini-break between Silvertone and Spa, Hamilton claimed to have drafted up documents detailing where the team goes from here and met with Ferrari\u2019s chairman, the team CEO, and Ferrari\u2019s team principal. The scramble of high-profile meetings made the team dynamic look less collaborative and more desperate for a change of pace.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Leclerc, who has been the team\u2019s darling since 2019, has trudged through his own trenches at the team\u2014this past weekend included. After securing Ferrari\u2019s first pole of the season, the Monegasque was poised for a podium finish. Leclerc crossed the finish line just shy of third place after ranting in a lengthy radio message during Sunday\u2019s race: \u201cThis is so incredibly frustrating. We\u2019ve lost all competitiveness. You just have to listen to me; I would have found a different way of managing those issues. Now it\u2019s just undrivable. Undrivable. It\u2019s a miracle if we finish on the podium.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hamilton, in contrast, took the blame for his 12th-place finish: \u201cReally sorry about this weekend guys, for losing you points.\u201d Following his points-less performance, he insisted he still loves the sport. \u201cI still love it\u2026 I still love the team,\u201d Hamilton said. \u201cI look forward to coming back [in Zandvoort] \u2026 Hopefully I will be back.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"BUDAPEST,<\/p>\n

\"Lewis
\nGetty<\/p>\n

As Hamilton attempts to make peace with the career-defining risk he chose, he must also accept his role in steering another future: Carlos Sainz\u2019s career path. The former Ferrari driver who signed onto Williams<\/a> for the 2025 season has only scored 16 points so far this season and is sandwiched between two rookies in 16th place. Sainz dragged his carbon fiber machine into 14th place on Sunday. Hamilton\u2019s move may have set off a domino effect in the driver market as seats opened up for rookies, but his and other drivers\u2019 insistence on extending their careers in F1 also clogged the pipeline from the junior series to the big leagues.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Touted as one of the greatest drivers in the sport\u2019s history, Hamilton looked to Ferrari as the natural solution to his eight-time title challenge.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the most positive feeling I\u2019ve had in a long time,\u201d Hamilton said just six months ago. \u201cI\u2019ve always imagined what it would be like sitting in the cockpit surrounded by red.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, the dream of taming a prancing horse seems to be left somewhere on track in Hungary\u2014just like so many drivers who have looked to Maranello for success. As for Ferrari, the team is left with the question: If Hamilton can\u2019t fix them, who can?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Got a tip? Email us at tips@thedrive.com<\/p>\n

Olivia Hicks is a Brooklyn-based sports and environmental journalist specializing in the business, politics and culture behind Formula 1 for NPR and Motorsport.com. Over a race weekend, you can find her reporting live for The Independent. She is The Drive\u2019s F1 correspondent for the 2025 season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Get The Drive\u2019s daily newsletter The latest car news, reviews, and features. When Lewis Hamilton announced he would…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45241,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1687,372,6537,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-45240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-f1","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45240\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}