Lewis Hamilton said Thursday he has no regrets about joining Ferrari this season, downplaying recent remarks in which he admitted he wasn’t looking forward to next year and attributing them to the “heat of frustration.”
Speaking at the Lusail International Circuit ahead of this weekend’s Qatar Grand Prix, the penultimate race of the season, the 40-year-old seven-time world champion acknowledged that settling in at Ferrari will take time and that “building and growing” within the team is part of the process.
He also backed away from the sharper comments he made in recent weeks – when he described his first campaign with Ferrari as “a nightmare” and said he wasn’t eager for 2026 – calling them impulsive reactions born from a difficult stretch.
“I would be surprised if the other drivers are excited about next year at the end of a season,” he said. “Usually, you don’t have a lot of energy at the end of the season...
“It was in the heat of frustration and often there is a lot of frustration at the end of a race when it doesn’t go well. I am excited to see what the team does next year.”
Hamilton had been particularly glum in Las Vegas where, for the first time in his career, he was last in qualifying on pure pace but recovered to finish 10th, later promoted to eighth following the disqualification of both McLarens.
It extended his run of poor form through 2025 with Ferrari as he failed to break an unwanted streak of 22 races without a podium finish. He has never completed a season without a podium.
Asked if he had any regrets about leaving Mercedes – where he won six of his drivers’ titles – to join Ferrari, Hamilton replied: “Firstly, that is a hypothetical question and I won’t really get into that, but I don’t regret the decision I made in joining this team.
“I know it takes time to build and grow within an organization, and I expected that.”
He added: “We have a lot of work to do over the winter. We’ll analyze the season and there are lots of improvements we need to make collectively, but no one is under any illusions in the team.”
Hamilton is 74 points behind teammate Charles Leclerc in the drivers’ standings after being outqualified by the Monegasque 17 times in 22 Grands Prix. Leclerc also has seven podium finishes.
Hamilton said he was not concerned by those results.
“Charles has done a great job. He has been here for seven years and he has a team around him who he has worked with for many years, so it is a well-oiled machine.
“On my side, it is a new group of people. It is a new environment that I am still getting used to. We are working as hard as we can to get it to work as well as we can.
“To compare it to someone who has had it for seven years, you don’t just do it like that. It takes a bit of time.”
