Lewis Hamilton has expressed his frustration at the many – and repetitive – questions surrounding his blockbuster move to join Ferrari for the 2025 Formula 1 season.
Given Mercedes’ ongoing struggles to get to grips with these ground-effect F1 cars since the start of 2022, many questions have been raised about that potentially proving it was indeed the right decision for the seven-time champion to craft his way out of the Brackley squad into a much more competitive Ferrari, that got the only non-Red Bull win of the 2023 season and has already won a race in 2024.
Ahead of the Chinese GP, the Briton shrugged off any such suggestions, saying his move doesn’t need “vindicating”, and revealed an ongoing frustrating with “people talking shit” about it throughout the season so far – questions even have been raised about whether the winner of 103 grand prix would be a downgrade on Sainz, who has won only three races in his tenure in F1 so far – and added it is an “exciting time” for him:
“Well, I don’t feel like I need my decision vindicating. I think I know what’s right for me, and that hasn’t changed since the moment that I made the decision.
“There’s not been a moment where I’ve questioned it, and I’m not swayed by other people’s comments. Even today, there’s people continuing to talk shit, and it will continue on for the rest of the year.
“And I’ll have to just do what I did in the previous time. Only you can know what was right for you. And it will be an exciting time for me.”
The Briton had previously already showed his disappointment with any such questions last time out at the Japanese GP, when he asked a journalist if he had any “better questions” than just keep asking him for an opinion on the current Mercedes/Ferrari relative competitiveness.
Hamilton’s multi-year deal with the Scuderia will see him through at least the end of 2026 in the Maranello squad – and said that whilst that will get him past 40 years of age, he feels “young” and motivated just as Fernando Alonso, who’s new Aston Martin deal will see him on the grid with 45 years of age in 2026:
“I am going to be racing for quite some time still,” he declared. “So, it’s definitely good that [Fernando] is still around, I hope that he keeps going for a little bit longer as well.”
“I never thought that I’d be racing into my 40s. I’m pretty sure I said I wouldn’t go into my 40s racing, but I think it’s such a crazy trip, life, that I don’t feel like I’m nearly 40 years old. I feel really young still.”
