Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas — Photo: © IMAGO

F1 News & Gossip

Hamilton admits plans for future Mercedes return

Lewis Hamilton will join Ferrari in 2025

Sheona Mountford F1 Journalist

Motorsport journalist working in F1 since 2024.

Sunday 5 January 2025 02:00 Updated: 08:35

Lewis Hamilton has confessed that he intends to return to Mercedes, despite hish public split with the team at the end of last year.

The seven-time world champion officially completed his exit this week, moving to Ferrari for the next stage of a legendary career.

READ MORE: Hamilton set to ditch key partner

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Not only has Hamilton enjoyed more than a decade of championship defining success with the team, but also leaves behind an incredible legacy in regards to his work with diversity and inclusion.

During his time at Mercedes, Hamilton founded charitable foundation Mission 44 which is aimed at aiding underrepresented groups in education and acquiring roles in motorsport, whilst also ensuring this work translated over into the F1 team.

Lewis Hamilton has worked on diversity and inclusion at Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton leaves behind an incredible legacy at Mercedes

Will Hamilton’s relationship with Mercedes continue?

The champion has also stated that he would return to the team to check that there is still progress in this area, despite making his move to a rival team.

“I think the thing that I’m most proud of, when I think about what I leave behind, I hope in a positive way, is the work that we’ve done with diversity inclusion,” he said to the media at the Las Vegas Grand Prix.

“That’s been something I’m most proud of, from the first moments sitting down with Toto, for him being open-minded, for the whole team being open-minded, all the team members going through diversity inclusion training, actually creating the diversity team.

“We did ignite, actually really put the money where their mouth is and invested, and we have a very, very diverse team now, which is something that I’m really grateful to have been a part of.

“When I sit with Toto, I’m like, ‘when I leave, there’s going to be no one in the room that’s going to have these difficult conversations with you’, because I am the one that, I was like, ‘I hope that you continue that on’, and he said he will, so I’ll come by every now and then just to make sure that that continues on.”

Lewis Hamilton Ferrari Mercedes F1 Toto Wolff