Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari F1 car’s first details revealed including codename, as Hamilton details crucial criteria for Ferrari race engineer
Preparations are in full swing at Maranello ahead of the 2025 Formula 1 season which will be Lewis Hamilton’s first as a Ferrari driver after opting to leave Mercedes
Ferrari are “already advanced” with their plans for Lewis Hamilton’s first red racing machine.
The seven-time Formula 1 champion begins work at Maranello next January, almost a year on from his bombshell announcement that he is going to leave Mercedes. And though it is several months away, work is already well under way on the next phase of the team’s project.
The wheelbase is among the more significant factors to be changed. Hamilton has complained about his cockpit placement in his more recent Mercedes machines and Ferrari will want to avoid making their new star racer uncomfortable in his new car.
They also reportedly want to change from a pushrod-style front suspension to a pullrod, matching what rivals Red Bull and McLaren use on their own machines. At the back of the car, Ferrari still use a pullrod suspension while everyone else has done the opposite.
Some of these ideas, reports Gazzetta dello Sport, will be tested on track this year. The SF-24 will be used as something of a guinea pig in the later weeks of the campaign to help inform design decisions for the team’s 2025 car which will be Hamilton’s first.
Lewis Hamilton will team up with Charles Leclerc at Ferrari from next year (
As well as a new car, Hamilton will also have to work with a different race engineer when he makes the move to Italy. After months of speculation, his current long-time ally Peter ‘Bono’ Bonnington has signed a contract extension with Mercedes which sees him promoted to head of race engineering at Brackley.
Hamilton said he would have “loved it” if Bonnington had followed him to Ferrari but insisted he is delighted for his good friend. The Briton said: “Was I hoping? I would have loved to have continued with Bono, of course. We have a great relationship… I love him, he’s like a brother. But I’m really, really, really happy for him.”
Hamilton details crucial criteria for Ferrari race engineer
Lewis Hamilton will work with a new race engineer for the 2025 F1 season when he joins Ferrari from Mercedes.
Lewis Hamilton has explained what he expects from his new race engineer ahead of his switch to Ferrari next season.
Earlier this week Mercedes confirmed Peter Bonnington had been promoted to head of race engineering, ending speculation he will join Ferrari with Hamilton.
Bonnington, also known as ‘Bono’, has been Hamilton’s race engineer at Mercedes since the Briton joined the team in 2013.
However, Hamilton will have to build a new relationship with a new colleague at Ferrari as he starts a new career challenge.
When asked about the prospect of working with a new race engineer at Ferrari, Hamilton stated to media including RacingNews365: “I mean, it’s got to be someone you get on with.
“It’s got to be someone that you ultimately are able to find it easy to build a relationship with and trust.
“The next one [engineer] is going to be a discovery process. I’ll know early on whether or not it’s going to work or not but I think it’s just about communicating.”
Hamilton reveals Mercedes ‘pain’ after Russell DSQ
Hamilton enters the Dutch Grand Prix weekend as the most recent race winner, inheriting the victory from Belgium after team-mate George Russell was disqualified.
It marked his second win in the last three events – however the seven-time world champion admitted to a different feeling when it came to being gifted the win.
“We felt so happy that we had a one-two, it was the first time in a long, long time – to be affected by something like that, we all feel the pain,” he said.
“It’s from decisions and processes that we’ve gone through and we’ve missed.
“It affects all of us when one car doesn’t finish. We lost so we lost valuable points when we’re trying to catch up to Ferrari.
“It’s not ideal, but George took it very well. I went away on my holiday, I didn’t feel like I won a race.”
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