According to a report in Italian media, Ferrari has set about erasing Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes memory with a rigorous Formula 1 simulator programme.
Hamilton debuted with Ferrari this week, reporting to Maranello on Monday to meet with his new colleagues and heading out onto the Fiorano test circuit for the first time on Wednesday.
This comes after 12 seasons with Mercedes and Hamilton must understand a new way of working in Italy.
To help him along, Ferrari’s engineers put the seven-time world champion through his paces in the Scuderia’s simulator.
Sources have claimed to La Gazzetta dello Sport that Ferrari ran “different configurations and adjustments” to “erase” Hamilton’s memory of the Mercedes simulator.
The Scuderia ran Hamilton in the end-of-year specification SF-24 in the sim, tweaking suspension calibrations, engine maps and load levels to keep him on his toes.
After three rollercoaster years with Mercedes chasing set-up tweaks and development hurdles, wiping the slate clean at Ferrari could be just what the doctor ordered for Hamilton.
His education will continue with a simulator run in Ferrari’s 2025 challenger ahead of its official unveiling on February 19.
Such practices aren’t uncommon, with Red Bull seeking to give Daniel Ricciardo a factory reset upon his return to Milton Keynes from two bewildering years at McLaren.
Christian Horner remarked in 2023 upon welcoming Ricciardo back into the Red Bull fold as a development driver that “it was clear when he came back, that he picked up some habits that were not… that we didn’t recognise as the Daniel that had left us two or three years earlier.”
Fred Vasseur: ‘We have to find our own way with Lewis’
Ferrari and Hamilton are an exciting partnership, made evident by the delirium his arrival in Maranello has been met with.
F1’s most successful team, partnered with its most successful driver has a tough act to follow: the Mercedes/Hamilton partnership.
No driver/team combination has been as successful as Hamilton and Mercedes, despite it coming to a less-than-ideal end across the last few years.
Still, Ferrari’s determined methods to wipe the slate clean on the simulator backs up words uttered by Team Principal Fred Vasseur last month.
“It would be wrong for us to copy the Mercedes situation and just paint everything red,” Vasseur said (via Auto Motor und Sport).
“We have to find our own way with Lewis.”
Finding the way has begun in earnest and after driving around Fiorano in a Ferrari F1 car for the first time on Wednesday, Hamilton said: “When I started the car up and drove through that garage door, I had the biggest smile on my face.
“It reminded me of the very first time I tested a Formula 1 car,” he added.
“It was such an exciting and special moment, and here I am, almost 20 years later, feeling those emotions all over again.”
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