Last Updated on January 28 2026, 11:37 am

Lewis Hamilton has been wounded by comments from his former rivals suggesting after his worst ever season in Formula One he should have retired. The report in Blick claims that this has woken “new demons” in the save times champions mind which will drive him onto further success.

The former McLaren and Mercedes driver suffered his first in nineteen seasons where there podium on Sunday eluded his grasp. He was hammered in the head to head with team mate Charles Leclerc which in qualifying was 19-5 in favour of the Monegasque and 18-3 in terms of finishing positions in the Grand Prix.

F1 analysts believe Lewis never fully understood how to drive the ground effect cars which were in existence from 2022-25. The speed at which the underfloor centre of pressure moved from forward to rear and back again made the cars feel loose at the rear for Hamilton costing him in terms of confidence and ultimately lap time.

 

 

 

Hamilton’s intense dislike of simulators well known

However, the basic drive of all new 2026 cars will be more in line with the cars which Hamilton was used to for the majority of his career and the British driver explained on day one of the test in Barcelona he was ‘unusually excited’ for pre-season testing, something he’s not really felt before.

The key to Hamilton’s rejuvenation may well lie in the revelation he’s been attempting over the winter break something he’s previously dismissed as a waste of time. Lewis is known for his intense dislike of driving simulators and throughout his career has repeatedly said he cares little about spending time inside them.

When Lewis began his F1 career 20 years ago, the simulators used by the teams were fairly basic. Even gaming racing simulators appear more realistic in their graphics and the fully immersed effect of sitting behind the screens was for some discombobulating. Hamilton was one of those drivers and since then and throughout his career he has revelled in the fact he uses his team’s simulator sparsely.

His reasonings are straightforward. On track drivers rely largely on their physical response to sense changes in grip, under and oversteer impending and braking forces – all sensations the simulator does not deliver.

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Lewis does “20 laps a year” in the simulator

Further, Lewis has said the visual cues he gets in the virtual world are the primary input into how the driver reacts wheels in the real world these are secondary to the physical sensations. In particular Lewis over the years has mastered a high level of feel for braking and whilst simulators give a high level pf throttle and steering response, the feeling for the brakes is lacking making braking distances and lock ups much harder to judge.

Back in 2021 during his epic battle with Max Verstappen for the drivers’ championship, Lewis told Sky Sports: “I hardly ever drive the simulator. I maybe do 20 laps a year, maybe. I have no interest in the simulator.” Even following his move to Ferrari Hamilton avoided time in the simulator as Ralf Schumacher revealed from a conversation he had with a female member of the Scuderia.

“Lewis Hamilton is an old-school driver and therefore does not like to be on the simulator or in any case he rarely uses it. This is a problem nowadays. If you can’t try, you have to commit to the simulator, but he doesn’t like it or doesn’t want to do it,” said the ex-F1 racer. 

“I have no idea why and I didn’t ask her. I’ve only heard that he doesn’t do it, while Leclerc — like Verstappen — does it every day. This doesn’t help when you urgently need the driver, as in the case of Ferrari, to contribute to development.”

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Younger F1 drivers born to sim racing

Yet something has now changed. Maybe four years of little success and just two Grand Prix victories – one of which was gifted to him when his team mate George Russell was disqualified from P1 in Spa 2024 – have woken the seven times champion up to the fact, the simulator is an indispensable tool for the modern F1 driver.

Unlike Hamilton, the younger F1 drivers have grown up with sophisticated online racing simulators. Max Verstappen in his spare time spends hours a week training and racing with his online team. Such was the Dutch drivers’ commitment to spending time sim racing, Dr. Helmut Marko had to restrict his online activities during an F1 race weekend.

Lando Norris, Charles Lelcerc, Max Verstappen and most drivers of their era have grown up with sim racing which requires more of a ‘drive by numbers’ kind of approach. They are dedicated to learning the precise braking points at each corner, despite the lack of braking feel, and their visual inputs carry as much information as do the physical ones drivers of yesteryear depended on.

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Hamilton now committed to weekly sim sessions

Now Blick reports that not only has Lewi Hamilton been fully ingrained in the development of Ferrari’s Sf-26 car, but over the winter has committed to driving the Maranello simulator “at least once a week” for several hours. This jaw dropping change in the seven times champions approach to his racing is because he is hoping it will reduce the edge of his younger rivals and in some ways change his driving style to suit the modern F1 cars.

This together with Formula One dropping the ground effect cars which were often sketchy to drive appears to be the basis for Hamilton’s pre-season declared excitement for testing, although his first outing in Barcelona may well be in the pouring rain.

Charles Leclerc piloted Ferrari’s new challenger on the morning of day two in the Catalan city and Hamilton is expected to take over in the afternoon.

 

 

 

Red Bull’s rivals confused as sidepod trick lights up timing screens

Isack Hadjar: “We did many more laps than expected.” – The first day of Formula 1’s winter testing in Barcelona is traditionally about caution rather than drawing conclusions. Teams arrive with brand-new cars and unfamiliar power units, and their checklist is focused on reliability rather than outright speed. Yet on 26 January, Red Bull Racing managed to tick every box, and then some, with Isack Hadjar emerging as the paddock’s quiet benchmark.

The 21-year-old Frenchman, who is entering his first full season at the top level, set the fastest time of the day in the RB22. Although lap times from winter testing carry no official status and offer little predictive value, Hadjar’s performance nonetheless provided a morale boost for Red Bull Racing and its new Red Bull Powertrains-Ford project… READ MORE