04/06/2025 07:25
13-time F1 race winner David Coulthard believes Lewis Hamilton is
"punch drunk" amid his challenging start to life at Ferrari.
Hamilton joined the Italian squad this season following a highly
successful stint at Mercedes that spanned 12 years. The seven-time
champion sought a new challenge while also realising a dream of
racing for the historic Ferrari team - however, it has not been a
smooth start for the pairing. While Hamilton has enjoyed success at
the two sprint races held this year, he has had little success in
the nine grands prix staged so far. The event in Spain marked
another challenging event for Hamilton, who detailed it was t he
"worst experience" with car balance he has ever had. Despite
out-pacing team-mate Charles Leclerc during qualifying, Hamilton
was instructed to move aside for the Monegasque earlier on in the
race when he began to struggle. "Whether Lewis likes it or not, the
team in the situation they are right now, if the shoe is on the
other foot, they've got to release the faster car and then sort it
out later at the grand prix," Coulthard told Channel 4 . "In this
case, I think Lewis came into the race, he was not delivering the
pace at the beginning." Coulthard highlighted the Spanish event was
not all negative for Hamilton, but acknowledged the Briton is
likely surprised by how difficult the adjustment to Ferrari has
been. "There was an area in the middle of the grand prix where he
was actually matching Charles and looking like he was finding some
comfort there," he said. "So there are some reasons to be positive
for Lewis. "But right now, I think he's a little bit punch drunk
with the difficulties of getting up to speed with Ferrari."
