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Lewis Hamilton recently claimed that his former team, Mercedes, are quicker than Ferrari at the moment, based on their performance during the Japanese Grand Prix last weekend. The 7x world champion finished Sunday's race in P7, behind his teammate Charles Leclerc and both the Mercedes drivers.
After struggling to find a competitive car at Mercedes in the past three years, Lewis Hamilton moved over to Ferrari in 2025, with the hope of receiving a car good enough to compete for wins and podiums on a regular basis. The Italian team even pushed McLaren for the Constructors' title last year, while Mercedes sat in fourth in the standings, further vindicating Hamilton's switch.
But come 2025, Ferrari have started the season off in underwhelming fashion, while Mercedes seems to have a similar, if not better, pace than the team from Maranello.
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Now, Lewis Hamilton has claimed that the Silver Arrows may well be quicker than his team, and mentioned that their pace was the reason for George Russell to be able to get close to Charles Leclerc during the race on Sunday. PlanetF1 posted the Briton's quotes via their X account on Wednesday.
"Mercedes are faster than us, that's why you saw them so close to Charles [Leclerc]. They just have more pace than us at the moment."
While Russell did close the gap on Leclerc during the final stages of the Japanese GP, the 27-year-old still finished P5, just behind the Monegasque. Whereas, Mercedes rookie Kimi Antonelli, who has continued his brilliant start to life in F1, finished in P6, just ahead of the man he replaced at the German team.
The Ferrari and the Mercedes could well be close to each other during the next race at Bahrain as well, which is scheduled to go ahead this weekend, as the second leg of the 2025 season's first triple header.
Lewis Hamilton shares damning comparison between his Ferrari and Kimi Antonelli's Mercedes during the Japanese GP
Lewis Hamilton also shared that he simply could not follow Kim Antonelli's Mercedes through some part of the Suzuka Circuit on Sunday, due to his former team's superior pace when compared to his Ferrari. The Briton only made up one place throughout the race to finish P7 in the end.
Further explaining his statement about the Mercedes car being quicker than the Ferrari at the moment, Hamilton added via PlanetF1.com:
“When I was behind him [Antonelli], he was just so much quicker through certain parts of the circuit I couldn’t follow.”
It has not been all bad for Lewis Hamilton at the start of his journey in Scarlet Red, as the 40-year-old did claim his first win with his new team in the Chinese GP Sprint, during round 2 of the 2025 season. But in conventional qualifying and races, he has seemed to struggle, and has not been able to match his teammate's pace.
