Former Ferrari Boss Warns Hamilton's Relationship with Team Could Be "Over"

Former Ferrari team principal Maurizio Arrivabene has issued a stark warning that Lewis Hamilton's proactive approach at Maranello could be a sign his relationship with the team is already "over." The seven-time champion has been sending detailed technical documents to Ferrari's engineering department in an effort to help improve the car's performance, a method Arrivabene compares unfavorably to Sebastian Vettel's similar efforts during his own tenure at the Scuderia.

Why it matters:

Hamilton's move to Ferrari was one of the biggest driver transfers in F1 history, carrying immense expectations for a championship revival. If internal friction is developing over his hands-on engineering role, it could undermine the collaboration needed to build a title-winning car and derail the project before it truly begins. This dynamic echoes past struggles at Ferrari where driver-engineer relationships have proven critical to success or failure.

The details:

• Hamilton has been sending multiple technical documents to Ferrari leadership, including team principal Fred Vasseur, chassis director Loic Serra, and engine chief Benedetto Vigna, detailing issues with the current car and suggestions for 2026.
• Arrivabene, who led Ferrari from 2014-2019, directly compared this to Sebastian Vettel's habit of submitting similar "dossiers," which he labeled "almost useless."
• The former boss argues that when "a driver starts playing engineer, that's it. Then it's really over," emphasizing that drivers should stick to providing relevant on-track feedback rather than attempting detailed engineering work.
• In contrast, current Ferrari head of track engineering, Matteo Togninalli, has publicly stated that Hamilton's relationship with the team is "much less strained than it appears," suggesting a disconnect between public perception and internal reality.

Between the lines:

Arrivabene's comments reveal a fundamental philosophical divide about a driver's role within a top team. His perspective prioritizes a strict separation of duties, while Hamilton's approach reflects a modern, more integrated driver role seen at Mercedes. The success or failure of Hamilton's methods at Ferrari may depend on whether the team's culture can adapt to a superstar driver's deep technical involvement, or if it reverts to a more traditional, compartmentalized structure that has historically defined Maranello's operations.