Lewis Hamilton’s F1 purpose has changed and Ferrari MUST prove driver sacking was right call

Hamilton, Vasseur, socials — Photo: © IMAGO

F1 Opinion

Lewis Hamilton’s F1 purpose has changed and Ferrari MUST prove driver sacking was right call

Hamilton's Ferrari move displaced Sainz, but was that the right call?

Kerry Violet F1 News Editor

F1 editor and journalist covering motorsport since 2024.

Thursday 15 January 2026 11:27

Lewis Hamilton has seven drivers' championships and 105 grand prix victories to his name, so I think it's fair to say his move to Ferrari was not made out of desperation.

Despite their recent decline in F1, the Scuderia remain one of the most iconic motorsport brands on the planet and have managed to cling on to an allure that even Hamilton could not resist.

Thoughts of, 'imagine how amazing it would be to retire with Ferrari' and, 'what if they can give me a car that will finally produce an eighth world championship' are likely similar to those that tempted the 41-year-old to Maranello.

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But time is running out for pretty much everyone involved in Ferrari's 2026 project and Hamilton's role at the team could be about to change.

To make way for the former Mercedes star, Fred Vasseur's squad let go of a reliable driver in Carlos Sainz. So how is that working out?

Well, having spent the 2025 championship piloting the FW47, the Spaniard came away with more grand prix podiums than Hamilton (I'll let you decide if that's more telling of Williams' progress or Ferrari's decline').

No one knows how long Hamilton will stay at Ferrari, in fact the details of both he and Charles Leclerc's contracts have been debated, so the Brit needs to focus on one thing to save face this season— winning a grand prix in red.

Ending Ferrari F1 drought should be Hamilton's final goal

After his first year at Ferrari, Hamilton failed to win a single grand prix and only made an appearance on the podium when he won the 2025 Chinese GP sprint race.

That was early in the campaign when the tifosi could still cling on to hope that Hamilton's sprint win was a sign of success to come, but that couldn't have been further from the truth.

At the conclusion of the 2025 season, Sainz remains the driver who delivered Ferrari's most recent grand prix win and the Scuderia haven't won a main F1 event with Hamilton or Leclerc since the 2024 Mexican GP.

Ferrari now boast an unenviable 28-race win drought, and whilst it's nowhere near their longest in history (59 in a row from Spain 1990 to Germany 1994), it only brings more embarrassment to Vasseur after allegedly spending $70 million to get the seven-time champion to join the Italian squad.

It was Leclerc who ended Ferrari's second-worst drought in history at the 2022 Bahrain GP, when the Monegasque finally returned a splash of red to the top of the podium after 45 races.

Hamilton's chances of championship success aren't non-existent in 2026 but they are low, and his best chance now of retiring on a high is to end Ferrari's drought and prove that Vasseur's decision to sack Sainz was the right one.

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F1 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari Charles Leclerc Fred Vasseur