Wolff sends warning to Hamilton doubters

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Toto Wolff believes it is unwise for anyone to write off Lewis Hamilton amid his former driver’s difficult first half-season at Ferrari.

Amid Ferrari’s own disappointing 2025 season, Hamilton has yet to record a podium finish in his first 10 grands prix for his new team since leaving Wolff’s Mercedes at the end of last season. Team-mate Charles Leclerc has recorded three top-three finishes so far and leads Hamilton – whose best results have come in the two Sprints – by 25 points in the standings.

But Wolff, whose team rewrote the record books with seven-time world champion Hamilton across 12 seasons at Mercedes, thinks a period of adaptation for the British driver in his new surroundings is only natural.

“You don’t unlearn driving that quickly,” said the Mercedes team principal in an interview with the Bloomberg Hot Pursuit podcast.

“In 2021 he was great, then the regulations changed, and it got a little bit more difficult, but he was still performing on a very high level.

“And just by changing teams, suddenly you don’t lose your skills.

“I think everybody needs to have a period of adaption. Different car, different DNA of how that vehicle drives, a new engineering team that you need to start to work together then be involved with the continuous development on the car so it suits your driving style.

“It’s an all-Italian team; he’s a British guy parachuted in there – and that takes time.

“Also, we have seen a little bit of a pattern that Lewis at the beginning of the season, he needs to find that mojo and then the second half of the season has been always very strong.

“So don’t ever write Lewis Hamilton off.”

‘You always miss a person like Lewis Hamilton’

Hamilton and Wolff became F1’s most famous, and successful, team boss-driver partnership, with the Briton winning six of his seven Drivers’ Championships while at the Silver Arrows and the team claiming an unprecedented eight Constructors’ Championships in succession.

This is the first season since joining Mercedes in 2013 that Wolff has not worked with Hamilton, and the Austrian said: “You always have to miss a person like Lewis Hamilton.

“We are still close friends. We have given our word to each other that we will stay close friends.

“We are fighting hard on track with the gloves off because we need to fight for our respective teams and that’s the kind of rule we have. But off track we spend some time with each other, we travel with each other, and I don’t want to miss the friend that I’ve gotten for so many years.

“The longest driver-team relationship, 12 years – you rarely see that in any other sport. And when it comes to developing the car, obviously, he has a lot of experience, he has seen it all and to replace someone like Lewis Hamilton is always going to be difficult.”

Wolff draws Piastri example in Antonelli assessment

With George Russell taking on the role as Mercedes’ senior driver following Hamilton’s departure, the Brackley team chose to look to the future for their other seat and promoted Italian teenager Kimi Antonelli to motorsport’s top level.

The 18-year-old Italian has already achieved two early significant milestones in F1 – a maiden pole in the Miami Sprint in May and then a first podium a fortnight ago in a Canadian GP won by Russell – while there have also inevitably been a few more challenging weekends too so far in his rookie campaign.

Asked how long he thought it would likely take a young driver like Antonelli to reach the top of their game in F1, Wolff replied: “That has changed in the last few years because it is so difficult to manage the tyres.

“It’s not only about speed – how fast can you go in a single lap or in a race – but nurturing the tyres to drive as fast as you can in the same time not sliding them and not making them overheat because you lose tonnes of lap time. That is the limitation for young drivers coming up.

“A good example is Piastri, who is leading the championship. It took him a year and a half to catch up to Lando Norris and it’s been the first year that he has an edge on him and that is I think just the tyre management.

“With Kimi, he doesn’t know all of the circuits. It was the first time in Montreal, so you start with a massive disadvantage, but the car was good and he was able to be fast.

“But you probably need to look at the three-year programme and say that’s the time it needs for a young driver to challenge your more experienced team-mates, that are also super-fast. I mean, George today is among the best drivers in Formula 1. That’s something you need to give them, time.”

Sky Sports F1’s Austrian GP schedule

Thursday June 26
2pm: Drivers’ Press Conference

Friday June 27
8.50am: F3 Practice
10am: F2 Practice
12pm: Austrian GP Practice One (session starts at 12.30pm)*
1.55pm: F3 Qualifying*
2.50pm: F2 Qualifying*
3.35pm: Austrian GP Practice Two (session starts at 4pm)*
5.15pm: The F1 Show*

Saturday June 28
9am: F3 Sprint
11.15pm: Austrian GP Practice Three (session starts at 11.30am)
1.10pm: F2 Sprint
2.15pm: Austrian GP Qualifying build-up*
3pm: AUSTRIAN GP QUALIFYING*
5pm: Ted’s Qualifying Notebook

Sunday June 29
7.25am: F3 Feature Race
8.55am: F2 Feature Race
10.40am: Porsche Supercup
12.30pm: Grand Prix Sunday: Austrian GP build-up*
2pm: THE AUSTRIAN GRAND PRIX*
4pm: Chequered Flag: Austrian GP reaction*
5pm: Ted’s Notebook

*also on Sky Sports Main Event

Next up for the 2025 Formula 1 season is a return to Europe for the Austrian Grand Prix, which is live on Sky Sports F1 this weekend. Stream Sky Sports with NOW – no contract, cancel anytime.

This news was originally published on this post .

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