After Ferrari’s announcement of Lewis Hamilton signing with them for 2025 and beyond sent tremors through the F1 world in February 2024, it was rightly expected that his actual arrival in Maranello would be treated as a massive event. The seven-time world champion landed in Maranello earlier this week and left fans and Ferrari team members starstruck.
The Italian team’s engineer Fabio Taccaliti’s post summarizes what any random fan in Italy would have felt seeing Hamilton for the first time as a Scuderia Ferrari driver. Taccaliti works with Ferrari as an aerodynamicist besides being a triathlon athlete as well.
The 26-year-old Italian posted what he felt about meeting Hamilton at Ferrari’s base in an Instagram post. Taccaliti explained how all his efforts and hard work to date came to fruition on January 20th.
“If, as a child, someone had told me that one day I would work in the Aerodynamics department of Scuderia Ferrari, and share moments with a legend like Lewis Hamilton, I probably wouldn’t have believed it”, his caption read.
He felt that such a dream scenario of working for Ferrari and getting to meet a legend like Hamilton felt “impossible”. However, every step that he took towards developing his career as an aerodynamicist, “every night of study” and all the challenges he overcame have propelled him to this stage, which is still a privilege for many.
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Taccaliti’s comments also had undertones of how the #44 driver himself speaks about his journey to the top of F1. “This is the power of dreams: With sacrifice, dedication, and passion, nothing is out of reach,” the Briton had stated.
Being a triathlon athlete, Taccaliti would surely have multiple commonalities with Hamilton and would look to develop a good bond with the 40-year-old. Hamilton too may want to know more about how the Italian aerodynamicist manages his passion for triathlon besides his job at Ferrari.
Taccaliti’s passion for triathlon
Taccaliti’s strongest discipline in the triathlon is running, per Ku-cycle.com. His favorite distance is the ‘Ironman’ which covers over 140.6 miles with 26.2 miles worth of running and 112 miles of cycling. The 26-year-old has a best finish of ninth place in this distance category.
Not that Hamilton would want to pick up triathlon as another sport, but he would certainly ask Taccaliti about his training and experience. Perhaps it could come in handy for the Briton to inculcate into his F1 training regimen and help him to do better with Ferrari.
Regardless, Taccaliti would mainly work with Hamilton on the aero balance of his car. Firstly, the former Mercedes driver will have to adapt to the Ferrari car concept, which is quite different from his former team at Brackley. His rapport with aerodynamicists like Taccaliti would be crucial to get him familiarized with the car.
