"It's the same situation as Ronaldo to Juventus": Lewis Hamilton signing for Ferrari has sent fans into a frenzy in Italy, F1 journalist claims

Italian F1 journalist Carlo Vanzini recently gave an insight into how excited Italian F1 fans were after learning of Lewis Hamilton's move to Ferrari in 2025. Ferrari is widely followed in Italy and millions are loyal to the F1 team, even during the championship drought.

Speaking on the Sky Sports F1 live show, Vanzini talked about how Ferrari president John Elkann and the team were after Lewis Hamilton for quite some time. He also shared how fans are celebrating as if Ferrari has already won the championship.

He drew parallels between Hamilton's move to Ferrari and legendary footballer Cristiano Ronaldo's move from Real Madrid to Juventus in 2018, saying:

"We know, in the last 10 years, almost three times John Elkann and Ferrari were close to [signing a contract] with Lewis. It is quite a great story for Formula 1, for Ferrari, for Italian fans because, since this morning, I have received messages that it's like Ferrari has won the championship but not yet. It is the same situation that we had when Allegri decided to buy Ronaldo for Juventus."

Before this, Vanzini explained the timeline of how Italian journalists learned about Lewis Hamilton's move. At first, there was a lot of talk about Carlos Sainz's contract being stalled due to some issues. However, later in the day, they heard about the Mercedes driver and thought that it was almost impossible.

"Last night, at midnight, with some rumors before in the afternoon that maybe there were some problems with Carlos' contract, there was not a sign on it. So we were asking, 'Why?' Why they are waiting for this? There were some problems about rights of Carlos. The later day, we heard about Lewis and...was crazy, was impossible for us," he said.

Lewis Hamilton's arrival at Ferrari will give the Tifosi hope that they can finally taste the sweet championship victory after more than a decade.

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Throwback to Lewis Hamilton admitting he was a Ferrari fan but would always drive for Mercedes

Back in May 2022, Lewis Hamilton told Corriere della Sera that he was a Ferrari fan and would happily sit with their supporters and cheer on Charles Leclerc. However, he also said that he would always race for Mercedes since they were his family.

“[Charles] Leclerc is very strong, you could always see that. I would say one thing: if I could sit down with the fans on the bleachers over there, I would support Charles. I am a Ferrari fan. Of course, it would have been nice to race for Ferrari during my career, but things happen for specific reasons. Mercedes is my family, I will always be a Mercedes driver, like Stirling Moss was.”

Since Lewis Hamilton had an extremely deep-rooted connection with Mercedes, the recent news about him moving to Ferrari was mind blowing to every F1 fan.