Hamilton’s first weeks at Ferrari: ‘Where I’m supposed to be’

In April 1972, Ferrari completed the construction of its private test track adjacent to its factory in Maranello, Italy. Built on the border of the neighbouring town of Fiorano Modenese, the 1.8-mile circuit, which includes a Suzuka-style crossover, became known simply as Fiorano. It was designed to replicate features from the toughest racetracks of the era, including Zandvoort’s Tarzan corner, the Nürburgring’s Brünnchen jump and Monaco’s Gasometer hairpin (later reprofiled to become Rascasse), all lovingly re-created on former Italian farmland.

Upon completion of the circuit, the land’s preexisting farmhouse and stables were converted for the race team to use during test days, including an office on the ground floor for founder Enzo Ferrari. In the final 16 years of his life, it’s said that Ferrari was rarely happier than when he was watching one of his beloved Formula 1 cars being pushed to the limit on a lap of Fiorano. To this day, Ferrari’s office remains much as he left it on his death in August 1988 — complete with his original desk and bookshelves full of season reports dating back to 1947.

It was fitting, therefore, that on a cold and wet January morning earlier this year, Lewis Hamilton picked the farmhouse as the backdrop for his first official photograph as a Ferrari driver. Dressed in a black suit and black overcoat, he struck a timeless pose in front of a pristine Ferrari F40 — not only Hamilton’s favourite supercar, but also the last road car to be commissioned by Enzo Ferrari.

Once it had finished breaking the internet, the image immediately took its place in F1 history. As he stood for the camera, Hamilton must have known the impact the photo would have — not least on his former Mercedes boss Toto Wolff, who likened it to seeing a divorced partner in a new relationship.

A new chapter had opened in Hamilton’s remarkable story, and it promises to be the most thrilling yet. According to those closest to him, it has filled the 40-year-old with renewed energy as he prepares to race into a new era.

After his first few days as a Ferrari driver, Hamilton himself said it was like a new beginning.

“I’m really conscious of the fact that there are only a handful of special first times in life,” he said a couple of days after the photoshoot, having driven a Ferrari at Fiorano for the first time. “The first kiss, the first date, the first day of school, the first time in the job. I honestly thought that I’d had all my firsts, and nothing was ever going to be new again. I’m surprised by just how much I still love what I do.

“I’ve always imagined what it would be like sitting in the cockpit surrounded by red, and I’ve been waiting such a long time for it. So, firing the car up, it’s like such a new, uncharted journey, and it’s the most exciting thing that’s happened to me in as long as I can remember.

“It’s nothing like the car that I had before over the last 10, 12, 17 years. It’s unique. To feel the vibration of a Ferrari engine for the first time, wow, that’s what I think ultimately put the biggest smile on my face.”

A new home

Hamilton’s days at Maranello have already developed a sense of routine. He starts his mornings by running a few laps of Fiorano — part of an intense training regime to defy his advancing years — and then returns to his private motorhome, parked neatly next to the farmhouse, to get showered and changed.

When he was planning his move to Ferrari, Hamilton initially looked at residences in the nearby rolling hills of Emilia Romagna, but after viewing a couple of remote and spooky properties, he decided against being the single occupant of a rambling 19th-century villa. Instead, he has plans to buy a place in Milan — a city of high fashion and short espressos — where he has a network of friends to keep him company and meet for coffee.

Even a home in Milan would result in a two-hour commute each way to Maranello, though, which is why his motorhome — the same one he stays in at European races — has been so valuable during his early weeks at the team. More than anything else, the convenience of staying on the factory grounds has helped him maximise a commodity that is in increasingly short supply: time.

“From the day you join the team to the first race, it may seem a drawn-out period to [the media], but it’s not,” Hamilton said. “It’s a very short amount of time, and there’s no shortcuts that you can take. So we’re not taking it easy; we’re putting in the hours and we’re grafting.”

Long days at the factory have become routine, often starting as early as 7 a.m. and finishing late into the night. Engineering briefings that stretch beyond their morning window have also been known to continue over the dining table of his motorhome at lunch — another clear benefit of his temporary live-work accommodation.

“The biggest challenge is getting ready,” Hamilton told ESPN in an exclusive interview. “I remember in my previous team when I joined, it wasn’t until six months [later] I won my first race. It takes time to build relationships, to build trust with everybody, to understand how an organisation works, how people are tuned to work, how you can show up for people and get the best out of them, and vice versa.

“And there’s not really a shortcut for that. So I would say that the biggest challenge is: how can I blend in with this team? How can I merge with everyone here?”

To kick off his integration, Hamilton’s first days at Maranello were spent visiting every department and attempting to shake hands with every employee. Keen to make a good first impression, he offered his customary vise-like handshake to roughly 1,500 people, resulting in an aching forearm by the second day and a cold the following week.

What Hamilton has seen at the team over the past month has clearly inspired him, though. It’s still early days, but he is already convinced Ferrari has everything it needs for him to win the title this year.

“I worked with two world championship-winning teams before. I know what a winning team looks and feels like,” Hamilton said. “The passion here is like nothing you’ve ever seen. They’ve got absolutely every ingredient they need to win a world championship; it’s just about putting all the pieces together.”

Parlo Italiano

Although Ferrari operates a strict policy of conducting engineering meetings in English, the vast majority of its employees are native Italians. Hamilton has long harbored a desire to be bilingual and is now trying to achieve that goal by taking one-on-one Italian lessons in his spare time.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Hamilton’s karting career saw him compete regularly in Italy, allowing him to pick up a few useful phrases. That exposure to the language as a teenager has given him a starting point to build upon now that he has become one of the nation’s sporting heroes.

“I started racing in Italy when I was 13, so 1997,” he recalled. “I was there working with an Italian kart team and wanting to learn the language. I remember working with a mechanic and wanting to try and pick up some of the lingo.

“My dream has always been to be able to speak another language, but I guess when you’re always in an English-speaking country and you’re not forced necessarily to have to do so, it makes it maybe a little bit harder. But it was a language that I loved trying to learn back then, and I never quite finished it.”

Hamilton has already practiced his Italian on his new mechanics during the handful of test days he has completed with Ferrari and hopes his efforts will help build closer bonds with those around him.

“I guess I want people to know that I’m willing to go above and beyond to be able to blend in and to contribute to my fullest potential,” he added. “So I’m enjoying it, and it’s challenging to practise, and it’s definitely hard to always retain and remember the words.

“It’s not easy to learn another language, but I’m slowly getting there. I think consistency is key, and that’s why I really love being here at the factory, because I’m getting to practise more and more each day.”

Getting behind the wheel

Since joining Ferrari in January, Hamilton has taken part in four separate on-track tests. His debut was driving a 2023-spec car at Fiorano, completing 30 laps in front of his new team, members of his family (including his father, mother and stepmother) and thousands of the team’s fans, known as Tifosi, who crowded a nearby flyover that offers a view of the track.

Remarkably for a driver with 356 race starts to his name, Hamilton still had some pinch-me moments as he prepared for his first drive. While visiting the restroom ahead of his first run, he got a glimpse of himself in a mirror and couldn’t help but stop and take in the moment as he zipped up his all-red race suit.

His next test took place at the Circuit Barcelona-Catalunya and was always going to be a less ceremonial affair. Again in the 2023 car, he shared cockpit time with teammate Charles Leclerc, with the aim of getting used to the car’s systems, a new steering wheel layout and Ferrari’s trackside procedures.

It was at that test that he lost control of the car and damaged it against the barriers. Hamilton was fine, but sources suggest the notoriously wind-sensitive SF-23 caught him off guard as he was starting to explore the limits of its performance. Such accidents are not uncommon in private tests and, as strange as it sounds, Hamilton will have learned about the limitations of Ferrari’s latest generation of ground-effect cars from the crash.

He was back at the same track in a 2024-spec Ferrari a week later, albeit in a car that had been modified with a Monza wing to simulate the lower levels of downforce expected in 2026. The run plan was dictated by Pirelli and aimed at gathering as much data as possible about the slightly narrower tyres that F1 cars will race with next year.

Finally, he got his hands on this year’s car at its launch on Wednesday. Back at Fiorano, he split a 200-kilometre filming day with Leclerc in cold but dry conditions.

After digesting the lessons learned from all four tests, Hamilton has already started to understand what changes he might need to make to be as competitive as possible.

“I am definitely having to adapt my driving style,” he said. “It’s rare that you just jump in and it just fits. For example, the steering wheel is completely different. All the switch settings are completely different. The software is different. I’m having to adapt to that. I am adapting to a car that’s made quite differently to what I’ve worked with in the past.

“We’ll see as we get further down the line at the real race circuits that we’re going to just how much aligns and how much change I might have to do. The key is to be open-minded and to be dynamic. I think, luckily, with my experience, I should be able to do that.”

It’s clear Hamilton is not underestimating the size of the challenge ahead of him. It will take time for him to maximise his performance at Ferrari, and not just from a driving perspective, but his motivation seemingly knows no bounds.

play1:27Ferrari’s SF-25 takes to the track for the first time

Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc got up close and personal with Ferrari’s 2025 challenger, the SF-25, on track in Fiorano.

“I’ve always thought to myself, for me, I know how long it takes to build trust and grow within a team and grow with people,” Hamilton said. “I’ve experienced that with Mercedes, and I’ve experienced that with McLaren. I really cherish the longevity that I had within those places and the bonds that we created in that time, and they don’t happen overnight.

“But this step is huge. It couldn’t be any bigger. The organisation is massive. The passion adds to it from the fans, from the diversity, from the people within, for that desire to want to win.

“And you don’t want to let people down. You want to be able to deliver on your word. And so how I decided to come into this year, my resolution, my mentality, is I need to elevate in absolutely every area on my side. It’s not just, ‘This is who I am’ and I can just get in. I’ve got to elevate my fitness, my time management, how I engage with my engineers, how much time I spend in the factory, all these different things. And I’ve definitely done that, and I’m doing that and I will continue to do that in this strive for perfection and to achieve the success that I’m aiming to achieve. But it’s a lot of work, I have to say.”

Checkmate

To make that process even tougher, Hamilton faces a teammate who already has six years of experience racing for the team as well as an entire junior career as part of the Ferrari fold. Despite an age gap of more than 12 years between them, Leclerc and Hamilton appear to have got off on the right foot and already have a good relationship.

They both have interests in music, fashion and are proud owners of dogs (Hamilton’s British bulldog, Roscoe, met Leclerc’s miniature dachshund, Leo, at Silverstone last year). Of course, smiles and laughs are easy to share before a wheel has turned in anger, but there are genuine signs of healthy competition — something team boss Frédéric Vasseur said he will actively encourage.

Online chess has already sparked a mini rivalry in their first month as teammates. As of Wednesday, when the 2025 car was launched, Hamilton was up 3-2 against Leclerc, although the challenge of a new game had already been accepted.

play2:57How are Ferrari preparing Lewis Hamilton for a title challenge?

Laurence Edmondson and Nate Saunders discuss Lewis Hamilton’s private tests with Ferrari.

“We’ve got a great relationship,” Hamilton said of Leclerc. “And I’m just trying to observe how he works. He’s very, very professional. He’s clearly well-loved within this team and well embedded in this team.

“He jumps in the car and he’s on it straightaway. He’s very fast, and I’m completely aware of that. You’ve seen his qualifying laps that he’s put in. He’s put great races together. He’s only 27. He’s very mature for a 27-year-old, I think probably more mature than I was when I was 27.

“It is not going to be easy to beat him, naturally, but we’ll work together and we’ll collaborate to make sure the car and the team can move forwards in the right way. And we’re going to have some great races, I hope.”

‘I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be’

The clearest message coming from Hamilton’s first month at Ferrari is his renewed enthusiasm for F1. The three years since he missed out on the 2021 title in controversial circumstances now seem long and bruising as he and Mercedes struggled to rekindle the fire that had burned so bright from 2014 to 2022.

The move to Ferrari has presented Hamilton with a new beginning, one that has only deepened his love of the sport and his desire to go racing at the highest level.

“Winning the championship for Ferrari would feel like the first,” he said. “That’s what I’m working towards. I don’t think about [an eighth drivers’ championship]. I’m thinking about the first championship that the team’s won for some time. For me, it’s looking for that first one with the team.”

Hamilton sees no reason that first Ferrari title can’t happen this year, but until the cars hit the track at the first round in Australia, there’s little sense in making predictions. What’s clear is that Hamilton has no doubt in his mind that he made the right decision in joining Ferrari. Even looking at the yellow shield on his T-shirt during a media interview is enough to convince him of that.

“I look down at it and I’m like, ‘Wow!’ I can’t believe I’m finally here,” he said. “It’s taken me a long time to get here, but I’m glad it’s now. I feel like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be right at this moment.”

Source: espn.com