Lewis Hamilton will drive a Mercedes around Monaco for the final time this weekend. When he returns to the principality next year, he’ll be racing in scarlet red.
Hamilton has won the iconic race twice during his time with the Silver Arrows, first in 2016 and most recently in 2019. Unfortunately, there’s little prospect of adding to that tally this year.
While Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren are expected to battle it out at the front of the field, Mercedes are clearly F1’s fourth-fastest team right now. They’re somewhat lonely in the championship, 75 points behind McLaren in third but 35 ahead of a slumping Aston Martin.
Individually, Hamilton is enduring his poorest-ever start to an F1 season. While he’s ended his wait for a top-six finish at the last two races, he hasn’t yet come close to scoring a podium.
He’s scored just 35 points so far, an average of five per weekend, and is struggling relative to teammate George Russell. Russell leads the qualifying battle 6-1 and the race head-to-head 5-2.
Martin Brundle insists Lewis Hamilton will be ‘looking at Ferrari’
Hamilton said earlier this year that he can’t allow himself to be ‘distracted’ by his upcoming move to Ferrari. He maintains that his ‘commitment to the team’ is as strong as ever.
His boss Toto Wolff has echoed those sentiments. He’s assured the media that Hamilton has been nothing but professional since the winter Ferrari announcement.
But some pundits have still questioned whether he has one eye on the Scuderia. David Coulthard has suggested that he might be mentally checked out amid Mercedes’ ongoing struggles.
Meanwhile, Karun Chandhok says Hamilton will have ‘enjoyed’ watching Ferrari’s improvement this year. The Scuderia won the Australian Grand Prix through Carlos Sainz and have scored seven combined podiums so far.
Speaking live on Sky Sports F1 ahead of first practice at Monaco, Martin Brundle questioned whether Hamilton could in fact remain fully focused on Mercedes. He thinks it’s inevitable that he’ll be invested in Ferrari’s fortunes too.
“Lewis is not enjoying this season a whole lot, is he?” he said. “He’s had a couple of really strong races without doubt.
“He says he’s not looking at Ferrari at all, he’s focused only on Mercedes-Benz. But you can’t help but look at the Ferrari and think ‘yeah, that looks a pretty hand place to be going’. Obviously you’ve got to have your mind on the 2026 massive changes with chassis and power unit as well.”
Damon Hill has one big question for Toto Wolff about Lewis Hamilton
While things remain publicly amicable between Wolff and Hamilton, there’s apparently a distance between the two behind the scenes. The former feels somewhat betrayed, while the latter is tired of waiting for answers.
And there’s a risk of tension later in the year as the seven-time world champion gets closer and closer to joining Ferrari. Mercedes won’t want him to be able to take too many key secrets with him to Maranello.
Damon Hill is keen to ask Wolff when he plans to shut Hamilton out of engineering meetings. The team will want to utilise his expertise as they try to improve their car without inadvertently helping their rivals.
Ferrari have already taken some key staff from Mercedes ahead of Hamilton’s arrival. Loic Serra and Jerome D’Ambrosio are joining in key engineering and management roles, and the Briton’s race engineer Peter Bonnington could yet follow them.
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