Lewis Hamilton will ‘know early on’ if new Ferrari engineer relationship will work

Lewis Hamilton says he will “know early on” whether or not his relationship with his new F1 race engineer at Ferrari will work. 

The seven-time world champion will have a new race engineer for the first time in 13 years when he completes his blockbuster switch to Ferrari next season, with long-time race engineer Peter Bonnington not joining Hamilton.

‘Bono’ has been promoted to head of race engineering at Mercedes, meaning the pair’s iconic partnership will conclude when Hamilton leaves the team at the end of 2024.

It has not yet been confirmed who will engineer Hamilton at Ferrari but it is likely to be Riccardo Adami, who currently works with Carlos Sainz, who will move aside for the 39-year-old Briton.

“The team often [decides] for you,” Hamilton told media including Crash.net ahead of this weekend’s Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort. “I’ve had two number ones in my career. That’s not true actually; I’ve had Philip Prew, I’ve had Andy Lacombe, and I’ve had one other.

“When I joined this team, I just came in and Bono was the current head engineer at the time. It’s got to be someone you get on with, it’s got to be someone that you ultimately are able to find it easy to build a relationship with and trust.

“So the next one, that’s going to be a discovery process. I’ll know early on whether or not it’s going to work or not. I think it’s just about communicating.”

Asked if there will be any conversations about his Ferrari transition before January, Hamilton replied: “No. It’s tough. That makes it really difficult. I think it’s probably the same for anyone moving into a new office.

"It’s not until you go. It’ll be very heavy-loaded at the start of next year.”

Hamilton admitted he would have “loved to have continued with Bono” but stressed he is happy to see his close ally earn a promotion.

“I would have loved to have continued with Bono, of course. We have a great relationship. You heard in Silverstone, he’s like a brother. But I’m really, really, really happy for him,” Hamilton said.

“Like for me, it’s just about people doing what’s best, you have to do whatever’s best for you. Packing up and leaving, I can only imagine it’s not, him and his partner, it impacts both of them, so they have to do whatever’s right for him.

“I knew it would be like an unlikely scenario that he would go with me, because it’s such a drastic change within his life. But I’m really happy the team have acknowledged and made changes to this pathway within the team so he can grow more with it.

“I think he’ll now be able to show even more of the great things that he’s been doing. But either way, we’re going to be family forever. We’ve spoken about it. We just want to make sure we finish on a high.”

Hamilton will find familiar faces at Ferrari in the shape of Jock Clear, who was part of Hamilton’s engineering team in 2013 and 2014, and team principal Fred Vasseur, who ran the ART Grand Prix team with which Hamilton won the GP2 championship in 2006.