Lewis Hamilton’s Heroic Fourth-Place Finish Offers Hope

Lewis Hamilton’s fourth-place finish at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, his best main race result since joining Ferrari, served as a bittersweet reminder of the Italian team’s ongoing struggles in the 2025 Formula 1 season.

Despite the seven-time champion’s valiant effort to climb through the field from 12th on the grid, Ferrari found itself unable to compete with the front-running Red Bull and McLaren cars for a spot on the podium.

“Grazie a tutti (thank you, everyone) for the tifosi, that was for them,” Hamilton said over the team radio, acknowledging the passionate Ferrari fans who filled the stands with a sea of red.

Speaking to British broadcaster Sky Sports, Hamilton admitted that the team “didn’t expect the result that we had today,” and that it had been “tough to swallow” when both he and teammate Charles Leclerc qualified outside the top 10 on Saturday.

“I felt I won with the car, and I think you could probably see that. It felt so great to finally get the setup right,” he added. “I mean, ecstatic. I was hoping for some more laps. It would have been great to have challenged for a podium. Today I felt much more at one with the car, something I’d been chasing since the Sprint in China. Everything came together: the strategy, the pit stops, the balance, it all worked in harmony and allowed us to recover strongly from our qualifying position. There’s still work to do, especially over one lap, but if we can keep building on days like this, we’ll be in the mix for podiums.”

Hamilton’s stunning win in the F1 sprint race in China nearly two months ago, followed by a double disqualification for both him and Leclerc in the Grand Prix, marked the last time Ferrari looked truly competitive. Since then, the Italian team has struggled with setups, tires, and brakes as they attempt to extract maximum performance from their car without repeating the mistakes that led to illegal wear on Hamilton’s car’s floor in China.