Lewis Hamilton opened up on the Ferrari condition after 11 rounds of his first F1 season with the Italian team. He moved to Ferrari this season after having driven for Mercedes for a decade. His move wasn’t a smooth one, as the team suffered from incompetence earlier and Hamilton found it hard to adapt to the SF-25.
Although he did manage to win the Sprint in China, Hamilton was regularly spotted lurking within the midfield this season. The team was partly to blame. The car has had its issues as it was a different concept from the much more competitive SF-24 used last season. It seemingly understeered and also snapped into an oversteer on the outside of the corners, making it a difficult drive. However, there have been some improvements since Austria last week.
Heading into Silverstone next, Lewis Hamilton spoke optimistically. He mentioned that the car is better on the inside than it looks on the outside.
“I think it looks a lot worse outside than it probably is on the inside. It’s my first half of the year in a new team. It’s interesting to see how different teams work and operate. How they set the car up is completely different,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton further mentioned that he continues to question the Ferrari engineers about the car’s setup.
“I’m constantly battling the engineers, asking them questions. Because they set things up and are like: ‘This is how we always do it’ and I’m like: ‘What about this?'”
Hamilton also recently opened up about the subtle and slow improvements Ferrari is making.
“We are improving” Lewis Hamilton on recent Ferrari performance
As mentioned, Ferrari showcased quite a performance improvement in Austria earlier. This was after the team introduced a floor upgrade. They also seem to be strong at Silverstone. Moreover, the team is expected to bring in a major suspension upgrade in Belgium as well. While these improvements are slow, they surely are making the Italian outfit perform better.
Lewis Hamilton, responding to the concerns regarding their performance, mentioned the same.
“It’s a work in progress. There are changes I’m trying to implement and make. It seems to be quite a slow process but there is change and we are improving,” Sky Sports quoted him.
Ferrari has shown considerable improvement since the season’s start. The team was sitting in fourth place in the Constructors’ standings, but has moved up to second more recently. It is seemingly difficult to chase McLaren currently, but the runner-up trophy is seemingly the most they can have for a second consecutive year.
