Lewis Hamilton Questioned For Mysterious $50,00,000 Ferrari Rejection After Signing Slightly Heavier $63,000,000 Mercedes Contract

Lewis Hamilton made a statement a few weeks ago when he finally signed his blockbuster $63,000,000 contract extension with Mercedes. The Briton finally did so after months of speculation that he may even consider switching to rivals Ferrari. This is because reports had emerged that the Prancing Horse had offered the 38-year-old a $50 million contract.

With Hamilton rejecting Ferrari for only a slightly bigger offer, former F1 driver David Coulthard has attempted to analyze the seven-time champion’s decision in a recent interaction with former team owner Eddie Jordan on the most recent episode of the Formula for Success podcast.

After Coulthard attempted to raise his point, Jordan pointed out that Hamilton had indeed been in touch with Ferrari over a potential move. The Irish businessman made such a claim despite Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur always denying reports of his side offering a contract to Hamilton.

When asked about what conversations he holds with Hamilton, Vasseur simply replied, “I talk to him at every GP. He raced for me 20 years ago and we are still close. I helped him when he went to McLaren at the beginning of his F1 career. And we talk every now and then“. However, Vasseur made no mention of his side offering the Briton a contract.

Eddie Jordan gives his take on Lewis Hamilton turning down Ferrari offer

In the most recent episode of the Formula for Success podcast, David Coulthard brought up the topic of how Lewis Hamilton ended up signing a contract extension with Mercedes despite all the widespread rumors that preceded it. The former F1 driver explained how there had been speculations over the last few months that Hamilton may retire or that he had been talking to Ferrari over a potential move.

On hearing the same, Eddie Jordan told Coulthard, “He did talk to Ferrari.” When Coulthard asked Jordan for confirmation, the Irish businessman added, “Yeah. I’d like to really know what happened there. And why did Ferrari move away from it, or why did Lewis move away from it?”

Jordan believes that such a move did make sense for Hamilton as winning for Ferrari in F1 is the ultimate dream of most drivers. After stating the same, he concluded by explaining that the only reason that comes to his mind is that the 38-year-old Briton feels very comfortable at Mercedes at the moment.

While Jordan has his own view of the situation, Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff gave an extremely interesting take on why he believed that rumors had arisen about Hamilton potentially making a move to Ferrari. The Austrian believes that such rumors only arose to impact Hamilton’s contract situation with the Silver Arrows.

Wolff reveals he was always confident of Hamilton staying at Mercedes

In his most recent interview with Sky Sports, Toto Wolff made it clear that he never had any doubts that Lewis Hamilton might leave Mercedes. The Austrian said that the two had a pact, as per which both would only look for options elsewhere if both had mutually decided that they no longer wanted to continue their partnership.

It is this reason why the 51-year-old believes that the Ferrari rumors only arose to impact his side’s contract situation with the Briton. Wolff then added that the contract with Mercedes and Hamilton has been ready since 2013. The Austrian stated that the only two things that changed in the deal were the dates and the number of marketing days.