F1 News: Lewis Hamilton missed Ferrari meetings, why things are better now

Angry Vasseur on the phone edited behind Hamilton covering his face with his hand in Ferrari F1 kit — Photo: © IMAGO

Lewis Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton missed Ferrari meetings, why things are better now

Lewis Hamilton has had a solid start to 2026

Sam Cook Digital Journalist

Sports Journalist who has been covering motorsport since 2023

Sunday 5 April 2026 18:56

Seven-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton has revealed why he was absent from some key Ferrari meetings last year.

Hamilton joined Ferrari at the beginning of 2025 in the hope of being able to challenge for a record-breaking eighth world championship title, but a mixture of poor driver form and lacklustre car performance meant that he was only able to finish sixth in the drivers' championship.

The seven-time champion didn't even claim a grand prix podium in 2025, a hoodoo that he has banished already in 2026 with a third-place finish at the Chinese Grand Prix.

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Ferrari have had a much-improved start to the season, with their SF-26 seemingly the second-fastest car on the F1 2026 grid.

The team are now looking to bring upgrades to the car and power unit in order to start closing the gap to the dominant Mercedes outfit and give Hamilton and Charles Leclerc a car capable of winning races.

And Hamilton has said that this start to the season has made it crucial for the team and drivers to meet in order to attempt to improve the team's performance, something that he said was missing in 2025 because there was 'no point'.

"We are seeing development coming through, I was at the factory last week and this is the time you can go to the different departments, you can hold meetings with people and say hey, what are you focusing on here, these are the areas I am really struggling with the car, can you put some more resource here, this is exactly what we need," he told F1.com.

"Last year we couldn’t do that because there was no point going and having those meetings for the car we were in. But, at least we got to have those in plan for this year."

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Will Ferrari launch a challenge for the title in 2026?

While Mercedes are clearly the fastest team in the early forays of the new regulations, they have only managed to pull out a 45-point gap to Ferrari in the constructors' championship heading into the five-week break in the season.

And two FIA rulings could be set to rock the Brackley-based outfit's performance in the next few months too.

They are having to change their power unit by June 1 because of a geometric compression ratio trick which has been outlawed in the sporting regulations, and this could be worth up to 0.3 seconds per lap.

On top of this, their rival power unit manufacturers - including Ferrari - could get the chance to bring upgrades to their power units via the new Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities (ADUO), which was put in place at the start of the season as a safety net for struggling manufacturers.

There are three periods in which changes can be made, after races six, 12 and 18, but only if certain criteria are met.

All of this could lead Ferrari to be able to get closer to Mercedes' performance levels by mid-June, although a fight for either championship would likely be a stretch.

F1 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari