F1 Austrian Grand Prix: Lewis Hamilton set to hit record LOW as Ferrari misery compounds

Photo: © IMAGO

Lewis Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton set to hit record F1 LOW as Ferrari misery compounds

Lewis Hamilton has had a disappointing start to his Ferrari F1 career

Sam Cook Digital Journalist

Sports Journalist who has been covering motorsport since 2023

Thursday 26 June 2025 21:11

Lewis Hamilton will head to Austria this weekend hoping to try and avoid an unwanted record, as his start to life at Ferrari prepares to hit new lows.

The seven-time F1 champion joined Ferrari from Mercedes back in January, but is sat down in sixth in this season's drivers' championship heading into the 11th round, 25 points behind team-mate Charles Leclerc.

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Hamilton has only out-qualified Leclerc three times in 2025, although two of those have come at the last two race weekends, but the 40-year-old's poor qualifying results have often left him with too much to do to get onto the podium in the main event.

His best grand prix performance so far with Ferrari is fourth, although his average main race finish position this season is 6.4 (when you take out his DSQ result from the Chinese Grand Prix).

Meanwhile, Leclerc has managed to pick up three podiums in his SF-25, something that has eluded Hamilton so far in his time with the Maranello-based outfit.

If the F1 legend once again fails to get on the podium at the Austrian Grand Prix this weekend, it will be 13 grands prix in a row the Brit has not been on the podium, which would mark a record stretch for his highly-successful career.

Hamilton has achieved 202 podiums since his debut in the sport in 2007 - an all-time F1 record - but has not finished in the top three of a main event since the 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix, one of his last races with Mercedes.

Lewis Hamilton has claimed 202 podiums in F1 - a record

It means in his first year with the Scuderia, Hamilton has already tied with his longest podium drought of his illustrious career of 12 races, which was an unwanted record earned during his disappointing final season with Mercedes.

That previous spell came during his drought between the 2023 Mexican GP and the 2024 Spanish GP, but heading into Austria, Hamilton could reach the worrying landmark of going 13 grands prix without a podium finish.

How does Hamilton avoid unwanted F1 record?

First of all, the seven-time world champion will need to qualify well in Austria. His and Ferrari's race pace has been inconsistent at best in 2025, and the general feeling is that Hamilton can only challenge the likes of Max Verstappen, Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris if he qualifies above them.

The Chinese GP sprint race, for example, saw Hamilton claim his only race win of any kind with Ferrari after starting from pole position. Using the clean air and lack of a fight with another car, the Brit was able to pull out a huge gap to McLaren's Piastri.

If he can get his SF-25 ahead of Leclerc for the third time in a row on Saturday, he will likely be in a good position to be able to challenge for a podium, although Mercedes' recent pace means that both George Russell and Kimi Antonelli can be added to the list of favourites for the race victory.

Hamilton's last grand prix win came at the 2024 Belgian GP, in a period in his final Mercedes season where he claimed two race wins in three races. Since then, however, he has scored just one podium.

This sad statistic has led to some questioning his move to Ferrari, and former racer Ralf Schumacher even said the champion may exit the sport before the end of his Ferrari contract, which is due to run until the end of the 2026 season.

While qualifying has been Hamilton's Achilles heel for the last two seasons, his race pace has also left a lot to be desired. Having qualified ahead of Leclerc in Spain, Ferrari had to implement team orders to allow Leclerc through due to Hamilton's slow pace.

The same happened in China on one of the other occasions in which Hamilton had out-qualified Leclerc. Canada was a bit of an anomaly due to damage sustained on Hamilton's car, but in Monaco, he finished over 50 seconds behind his team-mate.

So, the Ferrari star needs to improve his qualifying performance before delivering more consistent race pace. Easy, right? Why have no other struggling F1 drivers thought of that?

Written by

Sam Cook - Digital Journalist

Sam Cook is a talented young sports journalist and social media professional who now specialises in Formula 1, having previously worked as a football journalist and a local news reporter for a variety of different brands.

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F1 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari Mercedes Charles Leclerc