Mercedes boss Toto Wolf defended Lewis Hamilton for a slow start to his life at Ferrari.
Twelve years after Mercedes, Hamilton shocked the world of sports by announcing his switch to Ferrari for the 2025 F1 season.
However, Hamilton Ferrari’s partnership has not met expectations.
Ferrari’s SF-25 is not on track.
Even at the hands of Charles Leclerc, it only finished three times on the podium.
Hamilton’s best result was in the Chinese sprint race, winning from pole position.
Hamilton openly talks about how Ferrari F1 Challengers drive and how they set up the car, something completely different to how it was done at Mercedes.
His former team boss helped him turn things around.
“You don’t make it seem uneasy to drive it quickly,” Wolf told the Bloomberg Hot pursuit.
“He was great in 2021. Then the regulations changed and it became a little more difficult, but he was still playing at a very high level.
“Just change teams and you won’t lose your skills all of a sudden. Everyone needs a period of adaptation: different cars, different DNA in how your vehicle is driven, and new engineering teams you need to start working with.
“Then you have to be involved in the ongoing development of the car to suit your driving style.
“It’s an All-Italian team and he’s a British guy parachute there, that takes time.
“We’ve also seen a bit of a pattern at the beginning of the season when Lewis needs to find his mojo. The second half of the season is always very strong.”
Wolf is still “close friend” with Hamilton.
Wolf is surprised by Hamilton’s decision to leave Mercedes, but he insists that their personal relationships are becoming stronger.
“You have to miss someone like Lewis Hamilton all the time,” Wolf added. “And as you say, we are still close friends, we have given each other our words.
“We need to fight for each team, so we stop our gloves and get on track and fight hard, that’s the kind of rule we have.
“But off track, we spend time with each other and travel together. I don’t want to miss out on the friends I’ve had over the years.
“This is the longest driver team relationship in Formula 1-12. You rarely see it in other sports.
“And obviously he has a lot of experience when it comes to developing cars. He’s seen it all. It’s always going to be difficult to replace someone like Lewis Hamilton.”