Lewis Hamilton is all set to join Ferrari from the 2025 season onwards, having revealed the major news just a few days ago. While many will expect the seven-time world champion to be the leader of Ferrari, given his exploits in the sport, ex-F1 driver Ralf Schumacher predicts that the 39-year-old’s time at Maranello will not be easy. The former German driver expects Charles Leclerc to give Hamilton a tough time.
“When Hamilton is at Ferrari, he will try to be the team’s number 1, but I think he will have to fight for it because Leclerc has been there for a long time,” explained the six-time Grand Prix winner to Sky Germany as quoted by Soymotor.com.
After two winless seasons at Mercedes, Hamilton is keen to try and win an elusive record eighth world title with Ferrari. However, Leclerc would want to be the one to break Ferrari’s 16-year-long championship drought.
The 26-year-old will indeed be no easy teammate as many expect him to be the fastest man in terms of qualifying in today’s era. Hence, the Monegasque would do whatever it takes to upset Hamilton’s plans come 2025.
Charles Leclerc could give the ‘Sebastian Vettel’ treatment to Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari
Despite the respect Charles Leclerc might have for Lewis Hamilton, the inter-team rivalry could get very tense at Maranello. 2019-2020 was the last time Leclerc was paired up with a multi-time world champion – Sebastian Vettel.
While Leclerc comfortably outclassed the German, their rivalry had some intense fallouts like in Brazil in 2019 and in Austria in 2020. In 2025, however, the priorities of both drivers would be more on curbing Red Bull than asserting their dominance within the team.
Red Bull are the favorites to beat in both 2024 and 2025, considering the dominance they have established in the recent ground-effect era. Since there will be a major regulation change in 2026, a championship battle is only likely then.
While the rule set will change for the aerodynamic departments of the teams, too, the biggest change will be with the advent of brand-new engines. With Red Bull embarking on a solo mission with Ford, a Ferrari works PU in 2026 could really change the pecking order prevalent in the sport today.
