• Melbourne to host curtain-raiser for first time since 2019
• No new additions in 2025 as 24-race calendar remains

Lewis Hamilton will make his Ferrari debut in Australia after Formula One announced next season’s record-equalling 24-round calendar.

Hamilton, 39, is set to realise a childhood dream when he swaps Mercedes for Ferrari in 2025, with the seven-time world champion’s opening race to take place in Melbourne on 16 March.

Continue reading...

• German driver has been talking to team chiefs about F1 return
• Russell says Alonso ‘went too far’ in causing Melbourne clash

Lewis Hamilton has backed Sebastian Vettel to make a return to Formula One by stepping in to replace him at Mercedes when the British driver moves to Ferrari at the end of this season.

Vettel, the four-time world champion who retired at the end of 2022, has already revealed he has been in talks with teams , including the Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff. Speaking before this weekend’s Japanese Grand Prix, Hamilton added his support for Vettel to make a comeback with Mercedes.

Continue reading...

• Mercedes driver admits this season is ‘worse than 2009’
• Team principle Toto Wolff says lack of progress has been brutal

Lewis Hamilton described the worst Formula One season start of his career as tough on the spirit and warned it was a challenge leaving him in danger of just going through the motions, after he and Mercedes endured a dismal weekend at the Australian Grand Prix.

The seven-time champion’s team principal at Mercedes, Toto Wolff, was equally blunt in his assessment, describing it as brutally painful, conceding it was a fair question to ask if it was time he stepped down from the role and that he felt neither positive nor optimistic about his team’s situation.

Continue reading...

• Mercedes driver finishes 11th in Melbourne qualifying
• ‘There is a long list of things to fix. Our car is on a knife edge’

Lewis Hamilton said the inconsistency of his Mercedes “messes with the mind” following his worst qualifying performance in Australia for 14 years. Hamilton, who boasts a record eight pole positions at Melbourne’s Albert Park, will start Sunday’s 58-lap race from a disappointing 11th after he was eliminated in Q2.

Max Verstappen took pole – his third in as many races – as he bids to complete a record-equalling 10 victories, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz joining him on the front row. Hamilton qualified eighth in Saudi Arabia a fortnight ago, and ninth the week before in Bahrain.

Continue reading...

• Champion secures 35th pole, with Carlos Sainz taking second
• Lewis Hamilton 11th in final Melbourne Grand Prix for Mercedes

Max Verstappen has his sights set on a third-straight win to open 2024, with the defending Formula One world champion claiming pole for the Australian Grand Prix.

The Red Bull superstar blitzed qualifying on Saturday as he aims to back up last year’s race victory at Albert Park, securing the 35th pole of his career. Verstappen finished in front of resurgent Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz and his Red Bull teammate Sergio Pérez.

Continue reading...

• Red Bull record one-two finish for second race in succession
• Bearman impresses for Ferrari and finishes in points in seventh

Max Verstappen won the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix from pole position on Saturday as Red Bull continued their dominant start to the Formula One season with a second one-two in as many races.

Mexico’s Sergio Pérez was runner-up under the Jeddah floodlights, last year’s winner taking the chequered flag 13.643 seconds behind his triple world champion teammate, with Charles Leclerc third for Ferrari.

Continue reading...

Curtain raiser will provide welcome return to car racing over speculation surrounding the drama in season build-up

As Formula One heads into the opening weekend of the new season there will doubtless be something of a sigh of relief in welcoming the relatively straightforward business of cars racing after one of the most turbulent and dramatic close seasons F1 has experienced in decades. Finally, some spectacle over speculation.

When the lights go out in Bahrain on Saturday, the real form for 2024 will be on display as the testing phoney war comes to a close. Yet, even then, the aftershocks of the events of the last month will continue to resound across the longest season in F1’s history at 24 races and with an 8 December finish.

Continue reading...

• Hamilton described leaving Mercedes as his ‘hardest decision’
• Seven-time world champion will join Ferrari in 2025

Lewis Hamilton said his Mercedes exit to join Ferrari is because he believes it is time to write “a new chapter” in his record-breaking career.

Hamilton was speaking for the first time at length since his blockbuster move to the Italian giants in 2025 was confirmed earlier this month.

Continue reading...

The seven-time world champion’s choice to leave Mercedes will be remembered as a key moment in final chapter of Formula One legacy

Lewis Hamilton’s highly unexpected switch to Ferrari has ensured that, on transfer deadline day, the biggest deal of all was done in Formula One not football. Never one to shy away from a challenge, the seven-time world champion is making his boldest ever move in the last roll of the dice in his career.

This is a breathtaking and exhilarating deal. In opting to leave Mercedes for Ferrari in 2025 Hamilton has made the most significant team switch of the century. Having signed a new deal with Mercedes in August of last year, and after years of repeatedly denying rumours of a move to Ferrari, the 39-year-old has declared his intent to finish his career with the most famous, most storied, and most successful team in F1 history.

Continue reading...