At the end of the current season, Lewis Hamilton will leave Mercedes after 11 years to take up a new position at Ferrari. It’s starting to sink in that he will be starting from scratch at Maranello.
Few employees at Mercedes’ Brackley headquarters are people Hamilton hasn’t met and collaborated with; in fact, the present Mercedes setup has been essentially shaped around him. That is not at all what will happen the following year.
While he is familiar with many of the important Ferrari top management figures, it is a very different story on the shop floor, where he will hardly know anyone from his previous experiences.
When Hamilton won the GP2 championship in 2006, which guaranteed him a spot in the Formula One Championship with McLaren the following year, Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur was in charge of the ART Grand Prix.
Furthermore, it’s said that Hamilton’s relationship with Ferrari chairman John Elkann played a significant role in the talks that led to his decision to leave Mercedes at the end of this season in order to join the Scuderia in 2025.
“I know John really well, we met years ago in the Google camp,” Hamilton told PlanetF1.com last year. “I went to a Google camp in Sicily. That’s when our friendship started and we’ve always remained in touch.
“I’ve known Fred since 2005 and we’ve always had a really great relationship and we would talk often,” he continued. “I was in his team, then I came to F1 and you have less contact with the F2 series.
“But since he’s been back [in F1] we’ve met, we’ve had [talked] more, we’ve travelled together with Toto [Wolff, Hamilton’s current boss at Mercedes].
Former Mercedes employee Loic Serra, who was recently named head of chassis performance engineering, will join Hamilton at Ferrari. Jock Clear, who was Hamilton’s performance engineer at Mercedes in 2013–2014, is also employed at Ferrari.
However, a “no-poaching” clause in Hamilton’s Mercedes contract prohibits him from attempting to bring any members of his present entourage to Italy, so he will need to create a new support network from the ground up.
“That doesn’t really affect me personally,” Hamilton dismissed worries when addressing the media in Imola. “Obviously, I had a terrific professional relationship with Loic because we worked together for a very long time.
He then on, “And my first number two, Jock, works with that team.” “Aside from Fred, those are the only two people I believe I know extremely well. Really, that is all there is to it.
But Jock Clear has moved on since his time at Ferrari, and he now collaborates closely with Charles Leclerc, who will be Hamilton’s teammate and biggest opponent in the upcoming season.
However, Hamilton has a history of taking chances and taking big risks by stepping into the unknown.
Although many considered his 2013 move from McLaren to the new Mercedes works team to be daring almost to the point of recklessness, six world titles with the Silver Arrows have undoubtedly validated his choice.
Hamilton is presently just P7 in the drivers’ championship standings this year, trailing teammate George Russell. Hamilton hasn’t won a race since the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in 2021.
The question is whether Hamilton has left it too late to succeed in this most recent and probably final phase of his Formula One career, given that he will turn 40 before competing in his first race for Ferrari. This is especially true given that he will be starting from scratch.
