Hamilton’s Ferrari Move Comes Into Focus as Antonelli Wins With Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton’s move to Ferrari looks more complicated in hindsight now that Mercedes has won 12 of the season’s 19 Grands Prix and Kimi Antonelli has taken the drivers’ title. Martin Brundle thinks Hamilton may have wondered whether staying could have brought him an eighth championship. He also stresses that the answer is unknowable: George Russell was already a formidable teammate, and Mercedes’ current form doesn’t prove Hamilton would have won the title.

What Antonelli’s season changes in the comparison

Hamilton left Mercedes at the end of the 2024 season, bringing an era in which he won six of his world championships with the Brackley team to a close. He chose Ferrari, while Mercedes put Antonelli in the seat he vacated. The team has returned to the front after the latest technical changes, and Antonelli has accounted for nine of its 12 wins this year.

The results make the counterfactual tempting. Hamilton is 121 points behind Antonelli, despite still having a chance to finish second in the standings. His only win this season came at the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix in June. Set beside Antonelli’s title, that record gives Brundle’s hypothetical a sharp edge: the seat Hamilton left has become the route to the championship.

But a strong car does not make the title outcome automatic. Russell had been challenging Hamilton in their later seasons together, Brundle points out. Hamilton would have had to contend with that internal competition as well as the rest of the field. A driver’s record in one car can’t tell us how the same driver would have performed in another season, against a different teammate and under different circumstances.

Brundle sees a question, not a clear regret

Brundle told Sky Sports that some part of Hamilton may look at Antonelli and think the championship could have been his had he stayed. He paired that thought with a qualification: “But would it?” Russell, he said, was giving Hamilton “a pretty hard time” toward the end of their time as teammates. The gap between imagining a title and knowing Hamilton would have won one is the point.

Hamilton had also left a good-luck message for Antonelli on the wall of the Mercedes motorhome before departing. Brundle imagined Hamilton watching the young Italian succeed after receiving that note. It gives the story a personal detail, but it doesn’t erase the reasons for the move or establish that Hamilton now wishes he had stayed.

“I don’t think Lewis has got too many regrets,” Brundle said. Hamilton wanted to race for Ferrari, has done so, and, in Brundle’s view, is improving there. That assessment leaves room for a driver to appreciate a career choice while still noticing how differently events might have unfolded. The Mercedes results offer a comparison; they can’t supply an alternate version of Hamilton’s season.

Ferrari’s speed deficit sets the next test

Hamilton’s own comments point toward the practical issue Ferrari needs to address. After finishing second at the Mexico City Grand Prix, he congratulated Antonelli on a “phenomenal” achievement and said he was grateful to witness the 20-year-old become F1’s youngest-ever world champion. He then identified Ferrari’s straight-line speed as a weakness that had allowed Mercedes to pass it on many straights throughout the year.

“I’m hoping next year we have an engine to be able to actually compete with them,” Hamilton said. He believes Ferrari can build from the current car if the team fixes that weakness, adding that he has “100% faith” in its ability to do so. His confidence is clear, but the season’s results make the target concrete: Ferrari needs to reduce the speed gap that has repeatedly left it vulnerable against Mercedes.

That leaves Hamilton’s Ferrari move to be judged on what the team can produce next, rather than on a title that might have happened at Mercedes. Hamilton was contracted to Mercedes through the end of 2025, but chose to leave before the final year. Given his struggles toward the end of the ground-effect era, it’s uncertain whether the team would have extended his deal.

Toto Wolff has described Hamilton’s departure as resolving a headache, while Antonelli’s junior-category record had suggested he could become an exceptional talent. Even with Hamilton’s record in Mercedes colours, a place for him in the team beyond 2025 was not assured. For now, Antonelli’s title makes the decision easier to second-guess, while Ferrari’s ability to close its straight-line speed gap will determine how compelling Hamilton’s new chapter looks on track.