Six tenths in qualifying and a full thirty seconds in the race. Hamilton’s gap to his teammate in Jeddah was significant and exposed the challenges he’s facing — difficulties that aren’t limited to the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, but have extended across the recent races. The triple-header outside Europe has brought little satisfaction.
That disappointment came through clearly in Lewis Hamilton’s words after the race, as he didn’t hide his frustration or concern, especially because, at present, he has no clear ideas on how to recover the missing tenths to close in on Charles Leclerc — only hypotheses, circling around without resolution.
It was no surprise, then, that in interviews Hamilton opened with a very blunt message that went straight to the heart of the matter: “There’s nothing positive to take from today, just Charles [Leclerc] finishing on the podium, which is great for the team,” said the Briton, clearly disheartened after a race that offered little for him.
“It was horrible, not enjoyable at all. I was sliding everywhere. In the first stint, I had a lot of oversteer and the car just wouldn’t turn, with massive degradation. In the second stint, I found slightly better balance, but even then the pace was completely lacking, so overall it went pretty badly,” Lewis explained.
He had immediately gained a position on Carlos Sainz at the start thanks to a great launch from his grid slot, moving up to sixth. From that point on, aside from an excellent defense against Lando Norris that lasted a few laps — especially through managing DRS — Lewis Hamilton couldn’t find a better rhythm, remaining stuck in no man’s land.
He was too fast for the midfield runners behind him but, unfortunately, also too slow to challenge even the two Mercedes, despite the W16s suffering a noticeable drop in tyre performance.
The core issue is that, although Lewis Hamilton admitted he was struggling in medium-to-high-speed corners — particularly where confidence in the car is crucial at corner entry — he also had no concrete explanations for his problems.
“I don’t have an answer. I’m struggling. The balance… I struggle to feel the car underneath me. But yeah, there’s nothing specific. There’s nothing that makes you say: ‘That’s the problem.’”
“Even in Miami, I think I’ll be in trouble. I don’t know how much longer I’ll keep struggling, but it’s definitely frustrating,” he added, before drawing comparisons with Leclerc. The Monegasque clearly has deeper knowledge of the Ferrari’s behavior and the characteristics of the power unit, but he’s also adapted his driving style to extract the most from the SF-25.
“Well, I mean, he [Leclerc] has been driving this car for a long time, so he definitely knows it very well. There’s a lot to see in the data. Honestly, it doesn’t look like there’s a massive difference. It’s just that you’re slower in the corners,” Lewis Hamilton explained, pointing out how telemetry shows a clear mid-corner speed deficit compared to Charles Leclerc.
“We have slightly different setups. I need to see if maybe that’s the one the car prefers. And yeah, he and his side of the garage are definitely doing a better job. At the moment, there’s no solution. It’ll be like this for the rest of the year. It’s going to be painful. In qualifying it’s about extracting all the potential, and today in the race… I literally gave it everything, I tried everything, but the car just didn’t want to cooperate.” – the seven-time Formula 1 world champion concluded at the end of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
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