BREAKING NEWS:Ferrari confirm technical issue as Hamilton admits ‘work to do to improve’
Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton’s final session at pre-season testing was interrupted by a technical issue on his Ferrari, forcing him to cut his planned race simulation short. Hamilton, who is preparing to start his first season with Ferrari after 12 years at Mercedes, had enjoyed an encouraging start to testing, finishing second on the timesheet on Thursday.
However, his plans to run a full race simulation in the final session on Friday evening were blighted after Ferrari detected an anomaly on the telemetry. Speaking on Friday afternoon before his final opportunity to drive the SF-25 ahead of the season-opening Australian Grand Prix, Hamilton expressed his admiration for Lando Norris’ impressive race simulation for McLaren on Thursday.
“McLaren did a great run yesterday, and I think also Max did a decent one today, given the temperatures,” Hamilton said. “It’s hard to know what fuel loads everyone is running, as we’re all doing our own different programmes, so you have to take everything with a pinch of salt.”
Hamilton acknowledged that McLaren, the reigning constructors’ champions, are expected to be one of the quickest teams, alongside Red Bull. “For us, we’re just trying to improve,” he said. “I haven’t even done the long run yet, so I’m about to do it this afternoon, and I’ll get a bit of a better understanding of how this car behaves in a race stint.”
Unfortunately, Hamilton’s technical issue meant he was only able to complete 47 laps, compared to the 66 his teammate Charles Leclerc managed in the morning session. Despite the setback, Hamilton remained optimistic about the team’s progress.
“Overall, it’s been a great few days, and we’ve made some strong progress as a team,” he said in a press release from Ferrari. “We had to finish a little earlier than planned today, and the weather has been hard to predict all week, but that’s how testing works sometimes, and we’ve managed to gather a lot of good information to build on before the season starts.”
Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur echoed Hamilton’s sentiments, acknowledging that the team has made significant progress but still has work to do. “It has been hard to get a clear read on the overall situation here in Bahrain as the conditions were changing quite a lot day by day and from the morning to the afternoon,” Vasseur said.
Vasseur also cautioned that the true pecking order will only become clear in Melbourne, where the temperatures are expected to be significantly higher than in Bahrain. “If we look at the hierarchy of previous years, what we saw here was not the same as in qualifying a week later, under the same conditions,” he said. “We will go from 10-15 degrees on the track to the 45 we will have in Australia, so in Melbourne, it will probably be a whole different story.”
With the season-opening Australian Grand Prix just around the corner, Ferrari and Hamilton will be looking to build on their progress and challenge for both championships.
