Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur continues to stand by the quality of his work in Formula 1, insisting that his vision for the team is on the right path and urging patience from both fans and the international media. The French manager, now in his third year at the helm of the Scuderia, stresses that rebuilding a team to fight consistently for world championships is a long-term process. However, the reality on track is that this third season of his leadership has so far completely failed to meet the ambitious targets set at the beginning of the year by the Ferrari management itself.
This disappointing performance has been made even more glaring by the high-profile arrival of seven-time Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton, who made the shock decision to leave Mercedes after more than a decade and join the Maranello-based squad. His signing was the result of a direct and persistent courtship from Ferrari chairman John Elkann, a move that raised the expectations of fans and the paddock alike.
Lewis Hamilton and Frédéric Vasseur: a partnership struggling to click
Lewis Hamilton was convinced he would find fresh motivation and renewed energy wearing the famous red overalls of Ferrari after ending his long and trophy-filled relationship with Mercedes and the famous three-pointed star. Yet, after just eight months inside the Ferrari garage, the British driver has been confronted by the technical limitations of the SF-25 single-seater and by an adaptation process that has proven to be far more complex, delicate, and demanding than anyone had initially anticipated.
This sense of disorientation has pushed Lewis Hamilton to take on an unexpected and unusual role within the team — that of an internal motivator and advocate for structural improvements. He has personally presented detailed reports and internal dossiers to Ferrari’s senior management, identifying the areas in which the team is most vulnerable and suggesting where resources should be concentrated to address weaknesses.
It is a move that has surprised many observers, but one that can be interpreted as a positive sign. It shows a driver who is not passively accepting the situation but is instead actively pushing for change, acting almost like a team captain. Using his immense experience gained from over 15 seasons in Formula 1 and from winning more than 100 Grands Prix, Lewis Hamilton is trying to guide the historic Italian squad in the right direction, pointing out what he believes to be the best course of action for a return to winning ways.
However, there have also been visible moments of frustration. At the Hungarian Grand Prix, for instance, Lewis Hamilton was unable to hide his disappointment after qualifying and appeared visibly deflated, openly showing how difficult the situation has become. The seven-time world champion is without question one of the greatest drivers in Formula 1 history, but his adaptation to life inside Ferrari has proven to be extremely complicated.
There is already speculation about the next year’s car being built specifically around Lewis Hamilton’s driving style, with the hope of unlocking more of his potential. But in Formula 1, this is rarely a straightforward approach. When an entirely new set of technical regulations is introduced — as will be the case in 2026 — every team faces a clean slate, and countless unknowns emerge. Ferrari’s objective must remain the same: to create a car capable of fighting for victories and championships, not one tailored exclusively to Lewis Hamilton or to his team-mate Charles Leclerc.
The consistent progress that defines winning cycles
In top-level motorsport, periods of dominance are generally characterized by steady and measurable year-on-year improvements. The SF-25 project, internally designated as “677”, was born out of a technical reset intended to deliver a major step forward over the car used last season. Yet the opposite has happened — performance has regressed rather than improved. The positive signs that were visible in 2024 have not been carried over into the 2025 campaign, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to imagine that they will appear before the season ends.
Ferrari’s current second place in the Constructors’ Championship gives the impression of a competitive season, but that standing is misleading. It does not accurately reflect the true technical level of the SF-25 compared to its rivals. Mercedes has been plagued by inconsistent performance all year, leading team principal Toto Wolff to halt the development of the W16 entirely and to divert almost all resources towards designing the 2026 car. Red Bull, on the other hand, is still competing at the front largely thanks to the extraordinary skill and consistency of Max Verstappen.
To put the situation into perspective, Max Verstappen’s two team-mates, Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda who has stepped in, have contributed only seven of the 194 points accumulated by the Austrian team in the 2025 Constructors’ standings. And crucially, Ferrari is still the only one of the so-called “top teams” yet to win a race this season. The recent Hungarian Grand Prix seemed, for a moment, to offer a glimpse of hope and the promise of a resurgence, but that optimism quickly faded as reality reasserted itself.
Ferrari: past glories remain out of reach for now
Despite the abrupt halt in Ferrari’s growth trajectory under Frédéric Vasseur, the Frenchman has received a formal vote of confidence from the company’s senior management, who have confirmed him in his role as head of the Formula 1 Racing Division. The decision is understandable given the looming 2026 regulation revolution and the destabilizing effects that frequent changes in leadership have historically had on Ferrari’s Formula 1 programme.
Only time will tell whether this first half of the 2025 season will ultimately be remembered as an unfortunate but temporary setback. In the meantime, Fred Vasseur has drawn public comparisons between his own tenure and those of other celebrated team principals who needed several years before achieving major success — most notably fellow Frenchman Jean Todt and British rival Christian Horner.
Yet these comparisons do not stand up to close scrutiny. The main reason is that they ignore the vastly different starting points each of these leaders inherited. When Jean Todt took over Ferrari in 1993, the team had not won a single Grand Prix in three years, and its cars were regularly lapped by the dominant Williams machines of that era. Christian Horner, for his part, built Red Bull Racing virtually from scratch following the underwhelming Jaguar Racing years, transforming what was essentially a marketing project into a winning Formula 1 operation.
Sometimes it is better to remain silent
Both Jean Todt and Christian Horner faced enormous deficits in both technology and know-how compared to the category’s leading teams when they started. It is true that Frédéric Vasseur was parachuted into Maranello in an abrupt and unexpected way, but the organization he found was nothing like the struggling Ferrari of 1993 or the inexperienced Red Bull at the start of 2005.
In fact, Vasseur took control of a team that had just finished as runners-up in the Constructors’ Championship, although its ambitions had been curtailed by the effects of the 2022 technical directive TD039. Yes, both Todt and Horner needed several years to achieve championship success after joining their respective teams, but in their cases the upward trajectory was clear to see almost every season. With Vasseur, such progress is far less evident. The Frenchman does deserve further opportunities to prove himself, but drawing historical parallels of this kind risks misleading both the public and the team itself.
The danger is that people inside and outside the team may start to believe that everything so far has been acceptable, that setbacks are merely part of the process, and that the trajectory mirrors that of leaders who went on to write Formula 1 history. But this is not the reality. A greater degree of humility would be far more appropriate, because trying to “rewrite” a disappointing present by making selective and unlikely comparisons with the past does not change the facts. On the contrary, it reveals quite a lot about the mindset of the person making such comparisons. Good luck, Fred — but in certain cases, it is better to keep some thoughts to yourself.
