Lewis Hamilton gets immediate redemption shot as third Ferrari test approaches

Image credit: Scuderia Ferrari
Lewis Hamilton will have a chance to put his Barcelona crash behind him this week when he gets a rare chance to drive Ferrari’s 2024 car in a Pirelli tyre test.
Hamilton made an impressive start to life at Ferrari last month, receiving a warm reception upon his first official visits to the team’s Maranello factory and Fiorano test track.
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Hundreds of Ferrari’s hardcore fans, the Tifosi, flocked to Fiorano to witness the seven-time World Champion’s first test behind the wheel of a Ferrari Formula 1 car.
Hamilton is understood to have acquitted himself well in his debut test despite some issues with the pedals of the SF-23 car, driven in competition by team-mate Charles Leclerc and predecessor Carlos Sainz in the F1 2023 season.
After ‘a lot of work’ behind the scenes, Ferrari managed to find a quick fix to the pedals ahead of the team’s second TPC [Testing of Previous Car] test of the winter at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya last week.
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Hamilton shared driving duties with Leclerc on the first day of a three-day test at the Spanish Grand Prix venue, taking over the car for the afternoon session.
However, his pre-season preparations suffered a setback last Wednesday when he crashed in the final sector during the morning session, with the extensive repair work meaning Leclerc did not take to the track at all.
Initial reports from trackside suggested that the incident occurred at Turn 12, the long, winding and relatively slow-speed right-hander turn.
Yet more recent information has indicated that the crash took place at the high-speed final corner – restored to its original form ahead of the 2023 Spanish Grand Prix – with the scale of the damage and lengthy repairs both pointing to a more sizeable impact.
Ferrari and Hamilton, who is believed to have escaped completely unharmed from the accident, have not publicly addressed the crash in the days since.
Team and both drivers will be back in Barcelona this week to carry out a tyre test for F1 suppliers Pirelli, giving Hamilton a rare chance to drive Ferrari’s 2024 car.
Under F1 rules, only cars older than two years can be used for TPC tests to prevent teams from gaining a competitive advantage for the current season, meaning the SF-23 was the most modern Ferrari available to Hamilton for his first two tests with the team at Fiorano and Barcelona.
However, Ferrari have produced a heavily modified version of last year’s SF-24 to assist Pirelli’s development of the new tyres planned for the F1 2026 season.
Next year’s tyres are 25 millimetres narrower at the front and 30mm narrower at the rear, although the current 18-inch wheel rims will remain.
Hamilton and Leclerc are expected to sample experimental hard-compound tyres over the duration of the two-day test, which is scheduled to begin on Tuesday (February 4).
Reports from Italy have claimed that the so-called ‘mule’ car, intended to simulate the performance and downforce levels of the next-generation cars for 2026, will be lighter than the original SF-24.
The car is expected to run in an extreme low-downforce setup to make it closer in style to the 2026 cars, with the Barcelona circuit usually calling for a higher-downforce specification.
It is not uncommon for teams to produce mule cars to help tyre development ahead of major regulation changes, with then-Ferrari driver Sebastian Vettel spotted behind the wheel of a adapted version of the team’s 2015 car in 2016 ahead of the following year’s new rules.
The mule version of the SF15-T featured a larger rear wing and skirts, both targeted at replicating the high downforce levels of the new cars for 2017.
Vettel later questioned the true usefulness of the mule car running, with Pirelli estimating the modified 2015 chassis still fell around 20 per cent short of the downforce levels expected of the 2017 cars.
It has been speculated that Ferrari could extend their stay in Barcelona after the Pirelli test is completed to make up for Leclerc’s lost TPC track time last week.
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Under F1’s revised TPC test rules for F1 2025, drivers competing in the World Championship are restricted to a total of 1,000 kilometres of TPC running spread across four days.
Hamilton has already completed three of his allocated days behind the wheel of the SF-23 test, but the repercussions of the seven-time World Champion’s crash have left Leclerc on just two (one day each at Fiorano and Barcelona).
After this week’s test, Hamilton’s next appearance as a Ferrari driver is expected to come at F1’s first-ever collective season-launch event attended by all 10 teams and 20 drivers in London on February 18.
Hamilton and Leclerc will unveil Ferrari’s new livery – expected to be a deeper shade of red and feature more black than its predecessor – at the O2 Arena extravaganza before the SF-25 car is officially launched the following day.
As is tradition, both drivers are likely to get an initial taste of the SF-25 in a brief shakedown – almost certain to be held at Fiorano – before an official F1 pre-season test is held in Bahrain across February 26-28.
Hamilton and Leclerc are then expected to return to Italy for a joint event organised by Ferrari and new major sponsor UniCredit in Milan in early March before jetting off to Melbourne for the opening race of the F1 2025 season.
The Australian Grand Prix is scheduled to take place on March 16.
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