Lewis Hamilton encouraged by Ferrari SF-24 progress as foundation for 2025 F1 success
11/10/2024 09:37 AM
Lewis Hamilton is set to join Scuderia Ferrari soon, but in the meantime, his final season with Mercedes is progressively becoming an ordeal. The seven-time Formula 1 world champion, as has been the case since 2022, when the new generation of cars was introduced, has rarely managed to find harmony with Mercedes’ technical projects. Despite 2024 being the season with the most wins since the introduction of ground-effect single-seaters, Mercedes has struggled to maintain consistent results, highlighting the continued difficulties under Toto Wolff’s leadership in designing a reliable, competitive wing car.
Lewis Hamilton’s frequent mistakes in recent rounds of the 2024 Formula 1 championship should not mislead; he continues to approach race weekends with the utmost professionalism. However, it seems he is fighting with a car that does not meet his needs. The call from Ferrari likely came at the best possible moment in his career, as it seems unlikely Mercedes will return to their past glory in the final season of this regulatory framework, which they have never fully mastered.
The British driver therefore desired change and a new motivation. For the living legend of motorsport, Sir Lewis Hamilton, fighting for lower positions is quite demoralizing, despite the fact that his commitment has never wavered. Even last Sunday, battling for tenth position in the Brazilian Grand Prix, the Englishman did not hold back. Since 2022, the British driver has been a passenger on the Mercedes team's journey, suffering through some competitiveness issues despite occasional flashes of success. The Black King needed a challenge to complete the circle of his already extraordinary career, and there was no better destination than Maranello, at the heart of Ferrari.
Wearing the Italian team’s uniform and bearing the name Lewis Hamilton implies only one goal: to win, or at least to do everything possible to achieve it. The challenge is monumental, with no doubt about it, for various reasons. A Ferrari driver has not won the world championship since Lewis Hamilton, then a rookie, nearly claimed the title in 2007 with McLaren, only to lose it to Kimi Raikkonen. At Ferrari, he will find on the other side of the garage one of the strongest drivers on the circuit, a fan favorite in the red camp: Charles Leclerc.
On paper, staying in his “comfort zone” might have been the most logical option before taking on an ambassadorial role for Mercedes. But that was not the case; the seven-time Formula 1 world champion needed motivation and change. For that reason, Lewis Hamilton chose Ferrari sight unseen, even before the Italian team had shown the exponential progress we are now witnessing in the second part of the 2024 Formula 1 season. This progress began after the summer break when Ferrari's technical department corrected the disastrous underbody introduced under the direction of Italian aerodynamicist and former Ferrari technical director Enrico Cardile.
In this therefore clear that Lewis Hamilton is already competing for the championship in the 2025 Formula 1 campaign. In the customary interviews before the Brazilian Grand Prix at the Interlagos circuit, the British driver admitted to looking very closely at the significant progress of the SF-24 single-seater during the current F1 campaign. The next season's cars will be logical evolutions of the current technical projects that teams are developing until the end of this season. From January 2025, the priority for all Formula 1 teams will clearly be to understand and design the next-generation cars, which are set to debut in 2026.
If Ferrari's Project 677 shows the current level of competitiveness from the first Grand Prix at the Albert Park circuit in Australia, or even better, takes another step forward in terms of overall performance, the English driver will have his greatest opportunity to claim the elusive eighth world title. When Lewis Hamilton senses blood, he reverts to the driver we have always admired since his Formula 1 debut: a driver with undiminished speed, excellent race vision, and experience second only to Fernando Alonso.
If Ferrari's Sport Management can deliver a project worthy of their drivers' talent, only one problem remains: managing the inevitable internal rivalry between Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton. This duel may be quite challenging for the British champion, who, since signing with Ferrari, has known that beating the Monegasque will be anything but easy.
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