Lewis Hamilton is not enjoying the renaissance in his F1 career he hoped for when signing on the dotted line for Ferrari. The Italian team had a reasonably balanced driver line up with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz but the Spaniard had to make way for the seven times world champion by order of the Ferrari president John Elkann.

Hamilton was out in Q2 come qualifying at the 2025 Formula One Hungarian Grand Prix and will start the race in twelfth place on Sunday. Yet in the other SF-25 it was his team mate Charles Leclerc who astonishingly eat both McLaren drivers to claim his first pole position of the year.

Leclerc is now 10-4 ahead of Lewis in qualifying this season while in 2024 he was ahead Sainz on just five more occasions come the end of the season. In the Grand Prix Leclerc also finished ahead of his Spanish team mate on just five occasions more than Sainz did to him.

 

 

 

Hamilton offers to quit Ferrari

Hamilton is now 4-9 down to his team mate in terms of finishing ahead on Sundays this year. On average Lewis is 0.216 seconds slower on Saturday afternoon’s than Leclerc and in Hungary the quarter of a second difference between the two in Q2, saw Hamilton exit while Leclerc continued through to the top ten shootout.

A thoroughly dejected Hamilton took questions in the media pen following the session, which will see him start behind rookies such as Isack Hadjar, Gabriel Bortoleto, Liam Lawson along with Oliver Bearman in the Haas F1 car. When asked what his despondent radio message meant when he was told he was out in Q2, Lewis was barely audible when speaking. “It’s me every time,” he said shifting from one foot to another. 

Hamilton was pushed as to the meaning of his radio message “every time, every time” as to whether it was Saturday qualifying to which he was referring he replied, “its me, Im useless – absolutely useless,” whilst refusing to make eye contact with Rachel Brooks of Sky F1.

Ass his interviewer attempted to offer some solace to the seven ties world champion suggesting the car was not to his liking, Hamilton cut her off saying: “The team has no problem, the other car is on pole so…. they probably need to change the driver,” he muttered before walking away.

‘Albon at Red Bull’

 

 

 

Hamilton complaints over SF-25

Carlos Sainz has suffered a similar downward trajectory after his move to Williams that has Lewis Hamilton, with both drivers regularly beaten by their team mates on track with fourteen race weekends complete of this year. Hamilton claims to had sent a number of documents in to the team during the season, with suggestions on how the car could be improved more to his liking.

Yet the upgrade which debuted in Belgium and featured again on the SF-25 in Budapest appears to have delivered for Leclerc whilst Hamilton is as lost as ever. The final qualifying session at the Hungaroroing was the closest ever in F1 history, with all ten cars covered by just 0.542 of a second.

Hamilton’s high point of his Ferrari career came at round two in China, where he put his Ferrari on Sprint pole position, going on to hold off the field in the shorter race form on Saturday morning.

Conditions changed suddenly for Q3, with the wind doing a 180 degree about turn. Further the temperature had dropped around 15 degrees celsius from the start of Q1, making the preparation of the tyres for a push lap a sigificantly different proposition.

FIA change regulations without consultation

 

 

 

McLaren fail to react quickly

Having dominated the practice sessions in Hungary, McLaren were expected to easily place both their cars on there front row of the grid. But as the conditions changed quickly it was Leclerc who looked the most committed, as both Norris and Piastri admitted they were a little too cautious in the rapidly changing conditions.

Both McLaren drivers were significantly slower than their times in Q2 and Leclerc was the only driver to improve on his time from that session. With Leclerc on pole, Oscar Piastri who was favourite to start at the front in Hungary accepted “it was a pretty big surprise for us. Charles out qualifying us is one surprise but just how much we lost from Q2 to Q3 is a bit strange. There’s definitely some things to dig into.

My first lap [in q3] didn’t feel great, because the wind had shifted and I didn’t expect it. When you go into a corner expecting a lot more downforce than you have, that’s naturally going to happen. The second lap I knew which way the wind was going, but I couldn’t go any faster. That was a bit of a surprise, so something to look into.

When the data is analysed, McLaren will realise their drivers needed to push harder on their outlaws, given temperatures had dropped drastically. Fernando Alonso was being coached around his final outlap in qualifying, as his engineer helped in put the tyres in the perfect window for the final push.

Ferrari’s 17-Year Curse: President Finally Speaks Out

 

 

 

Hamilton threats to quit F1

Following a beating by George Russell over 21 race weekends in 2024, another poor performance in Brazil saw Hamilton threaten to quit his Mercedes team with three weekends remaining. ‘That was a disaster of a weekend guys,” Hamilton admitted on team radio. ‘That’s the worst the car has ever been. 

“But thank you for continuing to try, and great job to the guys at the pitstop. If this is the last time I get to perform,”  he added, hinting at a potential early end to his season, “it’s a shame it wasn’t great, but (I’m) grateful for you.”

The Ferrari driver has never recovered since the massive disappointment of failing to claim his eight title back in 2021. He went 945 days without a win from the previous race in Jeddah that year, only braking his duck at his home race in Silverstone last year. his only other victory since 2021 came in Spa last year too, although he inherited the win from hs team mate George Russell who was disqaulfieed for his car being underweight.

 

 

Verstappen: Horner sacking

 

 

MORE F1 NEWS – Albon: ‘2026 cars will not reward talent’

As Formula One moves into the second half of the 2025 season, attention is growing on the huge car design regulations coming in 2026. Radical new powertrains will debut, with a 50/50 split between electrical power and the internal combustion engine (ICE).

Yet it seems the manufacturers who agreed the regulations for the new power units may have pushed the boundary too far in terms of their desire to increase the current electrical contribution by over 300%. Fears have been expressed by a number of the drivers, that at times they will be required to shift down unnecessarily to ensure the ICE charges the battery to the required level.

At the Austrian Grand Prix, Lance Stroll was highly critical of the new regulations and suggested the reason more drivers have not spoken out about this is because they are being gagged. “I don’t know if that’s racing, it’s going to be the same for everyone next year – it’s all going to be about who can do that best,” he said…. READ MORE