Lewis Hamilton revealed that Ferrari has pinpointed a persistent issue with its car that has been affecting performance since the start of the 2025 season, following the Japanese Grand Prix.
At Suzuka, Hamilton finished seventh after starting from eighth, while team-mate Charles Leclerc secured a podium finish in third. While Ferrari ended last season with a more competitive car, they’ve struggled to match that form this year.
Speaking after the race, Hamilton shared that the team believes they’ve identified the fault contributing to their struggles.
“I think I did the best I could today,” Hamilton told Sky Sports. “[I was] generally lacking performance compared to the cars ahead of me, especially Mercedes, McLaren, and of course, Red Bull.”
He added, “We’ve found something on the car that’s been underperforming for the last three races, so I’m really hoping that once it’s fixed, I’ll start seeing better results.”
Hamilton mentioned that the issue is costing him more than a tenth of a second per lap, and he’s hopeful that it will be addressed in time for the next race.
“I’m hoping it’s fixed by the next race,” he said.
Hamilton also indicated that the team doesn’t yet fully understand the cause of the issue, but they are working to resolve it with a new component that is expected to arrive soon.
“They’re aware of it, but they don’t know exactly why it’s happening,” he said. “When the new component comes, hopefully, it’ll be resolved, and it will be the same across both cars.”
Despite the ongoing issue, Hamilton expressed satisfaction with his race pace given the circumstances.
“Considering that, I’m relatively happy with the race pace I had, given what I had. But otherwise, it was a good performance from the team. Myself and Riccardo did a really good job, and the engineers and mechanics also did a great job.”
However, Hamilton acknowledged the need to improve his qualifying performance.
“Clearly, getting a good qualifying is really important, and I’m not extracting the best out of the tyres, so that’s something I’ll work on.”
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