Was Ferrari chairman unfair to Hamilton and Leclerc? – F1 Q&A

The 2025 Formula 1 season is heading for a hectic climax with three races on successive weekends to decide the winner of the drivers’ championship.

Lando Norris has a commanding 24-point lead over McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri heading into the Las Vegas Grand Prix, which takes place under the lights on the Strip at 04:00 GMT on Sunday.

That is followed by grands prix in Qatar, from 28-30 November, and then Abu Dhabi, from 5-7 December.

Are Ferrari chair John Elkann’s comments that Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc need to concentrate “on driving and talk less” after their poor results this season unfair? – Jordan

John Elkann certainly caused a stir with his remarks the day after the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

It’s not clear what exactly provoked them, as Ferrari did not say.

But given they came less than 24 hours after Hamilton had said that his run of results in his first season at Ferrari were “a nightmare, and I have been living it for a while”, it would not be unreasonable to suppose the seven-time champion might have been in Elkann’s mind.

As far as Hamilton goes, this is typical of the sort of emotional remark he makes when he has had a disappointing race.

Remember when he said after Hungarian Grand Prix qualifying that he was “just useless” and “drove terribly” and Ferrari “probably need to change driver”?

He didn’t mean that then, not really. And Brazil should be seen in that context.

After all, Hamilton went on to say: “I believe there is something extraordinary up ahead in my life and in my destiny. I truly still believe in this team and what we can achieve together.”

Which is, one might think, exactly the sort of message Elkann would want to hear.

The issue many people had with Elkann’s comments was that their accuracy was questionable.

He singled out the mechanics for praise for “basically winning the championship with their performance and everything that has been done on the pit stops”, on the basis they are leading the rankings for average pit-stop time.

Fair enough, but then he said: “If we look at our engineers, there’s no doubt that the car has improved.”

Well, perhaps it has. But not relative to the opposition. Ferrari were 0.372 seconds off the pace on average in qualifying in the first half of the season, and so far in the second they are 0.472secs off.

As for the drivers, yes, Hamilton has been through the mill this year, but his performances have improved over the season, even if Brazil was a difficult race for him.

But Leclerc has been outstanding. And while he has pointed out regularly that the car is not quick enough, no-one would disagree with that, not even Elkann.

Ferrari are in F1 to win. Nothing less is good enough. That’s just a fact. And Leclerc has been steadfastly loyal to the team.

The grid seems to be as close in performance as I have ever seen. Has F1 succeeded in creating a situation where each driver’s performance over a weekend is a bigger differentiator than in the past, and does the upcoming regulation change threaten this balance? – Matt

It stands to reason that if the cars are closer in performance, then the driver would make more of a difference.

Whether that is more a factor now than at any other time is a difficult question to answer because there are a lot of aspects of F1 now that work in some ways to reduce the difference between drivers.

Telemetry, for example, allows drivers who are not as naturally able to find the limit a chance to catch up over a weekend.

You could see this, for example, at Alpine when Fernando Alonso partnered Esteban Ocon.

At the start of a weekend, Alonso would typically be considerably quicker than Ocon, who would inch closer with each session until he was competitive in qualifying and sometimes able to beat him.

Something else to factor in is that many would argue that the depth of talent at the top of F1 right now is as good as it has ever been, if not better.

In Hamilton, Max Verstappen and Alonso, there are three drivers who would be on anyone’s list of all-time greats.

In addition, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, George Russell and Leclerc are all exceptional, without question.

That’s at least seven world-class drivers in F1 at the same time.

Any major regulation change inevitably increases both the gaps between teams, and the risk that one team will steal a march on the rest of the field, as happened in 2022 with Red Bull and 2014 with Mercedes.

As the season nears the end, the rookies are increasingly showing their talent. Is there an argument to allow more testing in current cars for new drivers than the current regulations offer? Oliver Bearman, Kimi Antonelli and Isack Hadjar really look settled and in a good place. – Chris

Well, you could argue that there is no need to change the testing regulations as Antonelli, Bearman and Hadjar have all proved their talent without the need for it!

There is no appetite in F1 to increase testing allowances. Testing is expensive.

Having said that, there is an acceptance that rookie drivers could do with more opportunities to experience F1.

That’s why the rules were changed this year to force teams to run rookies in two sessions per car – a total of four for the season.

And it’s why teams have started running young drivers in cars from previous years – so called testing of previous cars (TPC) and testing of historic cars (THC).

Are Aston Martin the team to watch next season with Adrian Newey in charge of the design of next year’s car? – Ian

The truth is no-one knows what the competitive order will be next year, and no-one will know until the first race of the season.

Newey has a strong record when it comes to regulation changes. He aced the ones in 1998 with McLaren, 2009 with Red Bull (once the controversial advantage of Brawn’s double diffuser had been neutralised), and in 2022 with Red Bull again.

In 1998, he had officially joined McLaren only in September of the previous year. With Aston Martin, he has had six more months than that, albeit F1 is a lot more complex now.

Of course, the whole of F1 is waiting with interest to see how Newey gets on with Aston Martin.

On the engine side, Honda, which will become sole factory partner to Aston Martin, clearly knows what it’s doing.

Aston Martin’s lead driver is pretty handy, as well.

But success in F1 tends to come from stability. And stable is the last thing Aston Martin have been in recent years.

There have been a dizzying number staff changes at senior levels, and they are continuing to this day.

A new leadership structure has to bed down. Andy Cowell has only been chief executive officer for a little over a year, and Newey did not join until March this year.

Enrico Cardile was signed from Ferrari in July 2024, but took on his role as chief technical officer only in August.