Lewis Hamilton was left frustrated by his Ferrari team’s late strategic decision that might have cost him second place at the British Grand Prix, after he admitted he had endured an afternoon when nothing had gone right.
Ferrari opted to pit Hamilton under the safety car late in the race, which was won by Hamilton’s teammate Charles Leclerc. Hamilton had been in second position at the time in front of the Mercedes of George Russell, who stayed out, giving him track position. When the race came to a finish still under the safety car, Hamilton had not had the chance to make the place back on track.
When asked if he regretted the decision, Hamilton intimated he did not think it had been the right call. “The team asked me to stop,” he said. “I assumed in stopping that we would be holding position. If they told me, ‘You’re stopping and you’re losing position,’ I wouldn’t have done it.”
In a dramatic afternoon at Silverstone, Hamilton was also hit with a five-second penalty for a jump start and had to endure a post-race investigation for a yellow flag infringement, for which he was given a reprimand, while he admitted the car too had been a handful.
“Charles did a mega job today, fully deserves the win. From my side, pretty bad from the get-go. I jumped the start, which I have done very few times in the 380-odd races that I’ve done,” he said.
“I had the biggest understeer at the beginning of the race. I just couldn’t even turn the car until halfway through that first stint. Then the five-second [penalty] at the stop and then there’s just one thing after the other.”
Nonetheless the British driver, who had anticipated being well off the pace of Mercedes at Silverstone, did welcome what was a better than expected performance from the Ferrari. “It’s amazing to see the pace that we’ve had this weekend at this sort of circuit,” he said.
“We definitely didn’t anticipate it. So just phenomenal to be a strong weekend as a team and come away with really good points is really, really special.”
The former Red Bull team principal Christian Horner also made his return to the F1 paddock since he was sacked by the team in 2025 just 48 hours after the British GP last year.
The 52-year-old is understood to want to come back to the sport but at least as a part owner of team, having been linked to Alpine, Aston Martin and also Chinese car manufacturer BYD. “I’d only look at doing the right thing, something that had an opportunity to win at the end of the day,” he said.
“I have no interest in just being a number in a machine, I’ve more than demonstrated what I’m capable of doing, and if I go back it would only be in a position where you were empowered to make a change, to drive difference, to win.”
