There’s a stark distinction in morale between the 2 sides of the Ferrari storage. Charles Leclerc arrives on the sixth spherical of the championship after the robust efficiency in Jeddah, which earned the Maranello group its first podium of the season. The Monegasque, regardless of the challenges plaguing the SF-25, has discovered another resolution to extract the utmost potential from the automotive whereas ready for the updates to make the automotive extra aggressive.
Lewis Hamilton arrives in Miami with a really totally different spirit. Greater than the lackluster outcomes and the few factors collected within the first 5 Grands Prix of the season, the actual concern is the failure to discover a compromise setup that may improve Lewis Hamilton’s driving model. The weekend in Saudi Arabia was emblematic on this sense, marked by a “efficiency melancholy.”
Whereas within the first 4 rounds of the season, the Briton confirmed flashes of competitiveness even throughout the identical race, on the ultra-fast Jeddah observe he was soundly crushed by his teammate. The sensation is that the seven-time Method 1 world champion has not been capable of finding a stable baseline. A constant platform on which to regulate the SF-25’s setup to go well with each the driving force’s wants and the observe traits.
It’s a déjà vu of what occurred at Mercedes when ground-effect vehicles returned. On many weekends, the engineers assigned to Lewis Hamilton’s Silver Arrow operated via trial and error as a substitute of creating the setup from a primary configuration. Jeddah is a revealing observe on this respect. Lewis Hamilton was the pole-sitter and winner of the inaugural GP version there, after one in every of his many all-out battles with Max Verstappen.
The next yr, the primary with the present technical rules, he was sensationally eradicated in Q1. On the time, the discuss was of a setup that made the Mercedes W13 undriveable. On a number of events over the previous three years, the British driver has raced in no man’s land. If with a brand new group he nonetheless faces the identical difficulties he already skilled, it’s honest to ask some questions—maybe unpopular, however on the identical time believable.
Within the ground-effect period, Lewis Hamilton has by no means pushed the perfect automotive on the grid, besides specifically circumstances, reminiscent of Las Vegas or Spa-Francorchamps final season. In hindsight, his teammates, specifically George Russell and Charles Leclerc, regardless of the poor competitiveness of the vehicles, have proven higher efficiency than the Stevenage-born driver.
4 years into steady rules, we surprise if this technology of vehicles is actually incompatible with Lewis’s driving model. A discomfort recognized at Brackley, as defined by Andrew Shovlin, Mercedes’ trackside engineering director. The Englishman’s driving model has all the time been characterised by heavy braking adopted by sharp cornering, a way often called “V-ing.”
Present vehicles don’t improve this strategy, as they’re heavy and vulnerable to understeer. This makes it unattainable to hold most velocity via the apex. When the automotive allowed it, he managed to compensate along with his expertise for the issue in optimizing his power. Quite the opposite, with harder vehicles, the handicap has turn into too disruptive to general efficiency.
On this context, the work of the Maranello engineers and technicians is understandably robust, as there are numerous elements to think about in defining the setup. First, they have to set up a platform suited to the circuit’s traits. On observe, the setup should be refined to deal with the present problems with the 677 venture, and eventually, compromises should be discovered to make the automotive extra snug for Lewis Hamilton to drive.
Within the second Dash Race of the 2025 Method 1 season, we’ll see how far the mutual understanding between Ferrari and the British champion has come. Hopefully, the method can be fast sufficient to not waste what, not less than in concept, was imagined to mark the rebirth of the seven-time F1 world champion. We await the following two days on observe to be taught extra.
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