The initial wave of excitement after Lewis Hamilton’s move to Ferrari has started to settle, giving way to more realistic assessment of the Brit’s situation within the Italian team. As the season opener approaches, the focus has shifted to the challenges the seven-time champion may face, including transition.
Hamilton has been advised to familiarize himself with the team’s culture. And he has been putting extensive efforts to do just that. Hamilton has also been working to get up to speed with the mechanical package, considering he’s never driven a Ferrari-powered car in F1 before.
Former Ferrari driver and one of Hamilton’s close friends, Sebastian Vettel, recently underscored the big task at hand for the British ace. “Anyone who changes teams takes a big step. It’s a different culture. Obviously, most of the teams are English, only two are Italian. That’s probably the biggest change,” Vettel said.
Hamilton knows it all too well, and how the challenge is magnified since he spent the last 12 years at Mercedes, a team based in his home country. However, he is seasoned enough in the pinnacle of motorsports to find success.
“I am under no assumptions that it will be easy, it is not. But I don’t feel the pressure,” the 40-year-old said at the Australian GP press conference. Having spent years at the top of F1, facing the heat of the battle, Hamilton knows that he needs to focus on himself rather than pay heed to the outside noise.
“The outside pressure is non-existent to me, the pressure is within, what I want to achieve. I don’t have to prove anything to anybody,” he added.
Hamilton claimed that he prefers to stay in his own ‘bubble’, avoiding the chatter on social media surrounding his Ferrari move. “I don’t read the news, and I go long periods of time without social media…”
Anything short of a title win will be a failure for Hamilton and Ferrari. It most certainly won’t be an easy task, but the Briton knows what he is doing.
“I know what I can bring,” says Hamilton
While Ferrari presents multiple challenges for the seven-time world champion, he is no stranger to the sport. He may be a bit tentative at first while adapting to Ferrari power and other nuances of the red car, but nothing is likely to hold back his skill for long.
Catching up with the team pic.twitter.com/iMSqwSbmbo
— Scuderia Ferrari HP (@ScuderiaFerrari) March 13, 2025
Ahead of the season opener, Hamilton analyzed Ferrari’s engine data and last year’s telemetry to understand where he needs to adapt. While he joked that the data felt a bit alien to him due to his long history with Mercedes power units, he is embracing the challenge confidently.
“I know what I can bring. I know I can deliver. I know what it’s going to take to do that. And it’s just getting your head down and working away. So I come with a very open mind coming in this weekend,” said Hamilton.
Though he has only made such a move once before — joining Mercedes from McLaren in 2013 — what followed was a dominant era of championship success. Time will tell if he can recreate that magic with Scuderia Ferrari.
