Lewis Hamilton has yet to finish on the podium in a Grand Prix with Ferrari, while teammate Charles Leclerc has mustered only four rostrum results.
Ferrari’s difficult campaign comes after it gave McLaren a close battle in the 2024 Constructors’ Championship.
While Ferrari is second place in the standings, it owes much of that success to the problems of Red Bull’s second car, and Kimi Antonelli’s recent barren run for Mercedes.
Lewis Hamilton says he has been sending documents to Ferrari, in a bid to accelerate its progress and “challenge every area” of the team, vowing that he will avoid the failures encountered by previous drivers.
Ferrari is second in this year’s Constructors’ Championship but has endured a sub-par campaign.
Hamilton scored Sprint Race pole and victory in the second round, in China, but has yet to finish on the podium in a grand prix with Ferrari, while teammate Charles Leclerc has mustered only four rostrum results.
Ferrari’s difficult campaign comes after it gave McLaren a close battle in the 2024 Constructors’ Championship, while its current second place in the standings owes much to the problems of Red Bull’s second car, and Kimi Antonelli’s recent barren run for Mercedes.
Ferrari has not won a title since 2008, when it claimed its most recent Constructors’ crown, while Kimi Räikkönen was its last Drivers’ world title in 2007.
During that drought Ferrari has finished as runner-up on seven occasions, with Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel both arriving as world champions but failing to claim overall honors in red.
“I held a lot of meetings, I called a lot of meetings with the heads of the teams, so I’ve sat with John [Elkann], Benedetto [Vigna] and Fred [Vasseur],” Hamilton said. “I’ve sat with the head of our car development, Loic [Serra], with also the heads of different departments talking about the engine for next year, front suspension for next year, rear suspension for next year, things that you want, issues I have with this car.
“I’ve sent documents; through the year after the first few races I did a full document for the team, now during this break I had another two documents sent in, so I come in and want to address those, some of its structural adjustments we need to make as a team in order to get better, all the areas we want to improve, and the other one was really about this car, the current issues I have with this car that some things you do want to take onto next year’s car and some you want to work on changing.”
Hamilton pointed to the inability of “amazing drivers” to deliver a title for Ferrari as justification for why changes are still required.
“I see a huge amount of potential within this team, the passion, nothing comes close to that,” Hamilton said. “It is a huge organization, and there’s a lot of moving parts and not all of them are firing on all cylinders that need to be. That’s ultimately why the team’s not had the success it deserves.
“I feel that it's my job to challenge absolutely every area. To challenge everybody in the team, particularly the guys that are at the top, making the decisions.
“If you look at the team over the last 20 years, they’ve had amazing drivers, you’ve had Kimi, you’ve had Fernando, you’ve had Sebastian, all world champions, however they didn’t win a world champion [title with Ferrari], and for me, I refuse for that to be the case with me.
“I’m going the extra mile, I’ve been very fortunate to have experiences in two other great teams, and while things have to be different—because there’s a different culture and everything—but sometimes if you take the same path all the time you get the same result.
“So, I’m just challenging certain things and they’ve been incredibly responsive. I’m here to win, and I don’t have as much time as this guy,” Hamilton said, while sat alongside Kimi Antonelli, before adding “so it’s crunch time, I truly believe in the potential of this team, I believe they can win multiple world champions moving forwards.”
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