Lewis Hamilton Suggests Underlying Issue Behind Ferrari’s Woes in Spain
Lewis Hamilton has suggested that an unresolved issue may be worsening Ferrari’s performance struggles after Friday practice at the Spanish Grand Prix.
The British driver showed promising pace early on, placing third in FP1 with a time of 1:14.096s. While he was three-tenths behind Lando Norris, he outpaced Charles Leclerc by two-tenths and was just one-hundredth of a second slower than Max Verstappen.
However, FP2 saw a significant downturn, with Hamilton finishing the session in 11th place, nearly eight-tenths behind Oscar Piastri’s benchmark. Frustrated with the car’s handling, Hamilton told his engineers over the radio that it was “not driveable.”
Reflecting on the day, Hamilton said it was “not fun,” and admitted it had “not [been] a good day.”
When asked whether his experience could help guide the team forward, he responded, “I would say I’m motivating the team at the moment. Just keep your head down, keep working away and just don’t give up.
“We keep going, keep pushing, focus on solving the issues, which we’ll try do to do. You’re right on a Friday, you’re hoping for a good day, and it doesn’t go well. But then you have a weekend in Monaco where all of a sudden the car feels great and I honestly thought the car was going to be good today.
“But it wasn’t too bad in FP1, FP2 was quite a lot worse. Naturally that’s frustrating for everyone. We had some problem which meant we were losing some downforce, so hopefully with that fix for tomorrow we’ll be in a better place.”
He described the SF-25 as “not driveable.”
Vasseur Calls Hamilton’s Radio Outburst ‘Extreme’ Amid Afternoon Struggles
Team Principal Fred Vasseur acknowledged the team’s performance dip in the afternoon, calling the session “quite intense.”
“I think we had a very good pace this morning. We struggled a bit more in the afternoon,” Vasseur stated. “I think we had a decent lap with Charles before the mistake on [Turn] 7, he was in advance on P1.
“But the target is to put it up together, not to do some good corners only. And then we struggled a bit more at the beginning of each stint on the long stint.
“I think it was true for us, but true for a couple of other cars. The track was very dirty with a lot of marbles as soon as we were out of the line. It was quite difficult to recover.
“Overall, it was a long day, we collected also good information. It was the first time that we were running the front wing. I think we’ll have a lot of work tonight.”
Despite recognizing the challenges, Vasseur felt Hamilton’s criticism over the radio was overblown.
“The comments were a bit extreme on the radio today, but he did also a strong last stint with the Soft in the lap time of the first two.
“It meant that the car was not so horrible than he said on the radio. But again, the comments that they are doing when they are in the car for me, it’s not a drama.
“As long as they are back into the track and we have a constructive debriefing, this is the most important [thing].”
