Seven-time Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton will be part of Ferrari from 2025 on a multi-year deal, after activating a launch possibility within the Mercedes contract he signed in August.
The bombshell news, confirmed first by Mercedes after which in a one-line assertion from Ferrari, got here after a day of mounting hypothesis with the world awaiting news from Maranello and Brackley.
“Scuderia Ferrari is pleased to announce that Lewis Hamilton will be joining the team in 2025, on a multi-year contract,” Ferrari mentioned.
“I have had an amazing 11 years with this team and I’m so proud of what we have achieved together. Mercedes has been part of my life since I was 13 years old,” mentioned Hamilton within the Mercedes assertion.
“It’s a spot the place I’ve grown up, so making the choice to go away was one of many hardest selections I’ve ever needed to make.
“But the time is right for me to take this step and I’m excited to be taking on a new challenge.”
F1’s most profitable driver of all time, Hamilton mentioned he wished to complete his time at Mercedes on a excessive and was “100% committed to delivering the best performance I can this season and making my last year with the Silver Arrows, one to remember.”
The 39-year-old Briton is ready to switch Spanish driver Carlos Sainz at Ferrari alongside Charles Leclerc and provides the Italian workforce a world champion in considered one of their vehicles for the primary time since Germany’s Sebastian Vettel left in 2020.
The greatest driver transfer since Hamilton left a profitable McLaren for then-unproven Mercedes on the finish of 2012 got here as a shock regardless of common chatter that it may at some point occur.
Ferrari is the oldest, most glamorous and profitable workforce however and not using a driver’s title since 2007 and like Hamilton hungry to get again to the highest. The Briton has not received a race since December 2021.
His seven crowns are matched solely by German Michael Schumacher, who raced for Ferrari from 1996 to 2006 throughout a golden period at Maranello and made a comeback at Mercedes.
Many questions
Hamilton’s change raised loads of questions on why he had determined to go away, a month earlier than the beginning of the season, nevertheless it extends his profession into the game’s new engine period in 2026 and retains him firmly within the limelight.
Despite his loyalty to Mercedes, Hamilton has remained near Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur after profitable Formula Three and GP2 (now Formula Two) championships with the Frenchman’s ART workforce as a junior in 2005 and 2006.
He will go away Mercedes with a protracted checklist of data.
“In terms of a team-driver pairing, our relationship with Lewis has become the most successful the sport has seen, and that’s something we can look back on with pride,” mentioned Mercedes workforce boss Toto Wolff.
“Lewis will all the time be an essential a part of Mercedes motorsport historical past.
“However, we knew our partnership would come to a natural end at some point, and that day has now come. We accept Lewis’s decision to seek a fresh challenge, and our opportunities for the future are exciting to contemplate.”
Winner of a document 103 races and with 104 pole positions in a profession that began in 2007, Hamilton has not had the automobile to problem Red Bull and Max Verstappen in latest seasons.
The Briton was third total final 12 months whereas Mercedes had been runners-up.
Hamilton could have a well-established and fast workforce mate in Leclerc, whose contract was renewed final week for a number of extra seasons.
Mercedes should now begin the seek for a companion to Britain’s George Russell, with Sainz one attainable candidate though the Spaniard has additionally been linked to Audi when Sauber turns into their works workforce in 2026.
Source: www.dailysabah.com