Lewis Hamilton could not get out of his car for 20 minutes to face his team after announcing the switch to Ferrari, shares insider

F1 insider Matt Whyman claimed that Lewis Hamilton could not get out of his car for "20 minutes" before meeting his team members after announcing his switch to Ferrari from Mercedes. The seven-time world champion caught everyone by surprise after he announced his departure from the German team at the end of the 2024 season, given their successful 12-year stint.

The news was even more shocking as the 39-year-old had signed a contract extension with the Brackley-based outfit in August 2023 that would see him race for them until the end of the 2025 season. However, he decided to activate his release clause one year into his deal and made the switch to the Italian team.

In his book titled 'Inside Mercedes F1: Life in the Fast Lane', Matt Whyman spoke about the anxiousness faced by Lewis Hamilton before seeing his team members after the news broke. He said, via Mirror Sport:

"His team means a great deal to him - all his engineers, Bono, all the team, they mean such a lot to him. Every year he takes them paintballing, just a pre-season bonding experience, and it was all set up to go so he had to go to the paintballing."

"He said to me that he arrived and he saw them all waiting to go in. He said he could not get out of the car for 20 minutes. He was just so struck with, ‘What am I going to say to them after all of this time?’ He is very human. I do not think this was a robotic decision."

F1 insider speaks about Lewis Hamilton's reason for joining Ferrari

F1 insider Matt Whyman stated that Lewis Hamilton told him his reason for joining Ferrari was that he didn't want to miss out on the opportunity and regret it later. As quoted by the aforementioned source, the Mercedes driver said:

"I asked him directly what was going on and he just said, ‘It is every kid's dream who gets involved in motor racing to race a Ferrari, and that is it - I did not want to get to the end of my career and look back and go, what if?’"

"He says he knows when the end of his career will be. He has got this very clear plan ahead of him. He said it is really meaningful to him, the fact that he has won all these races with Mercedes and he has been on this journey. The one thing he had not done and he just thought, ‘I do not want to walk away and go, I wish I had done that'."

Lewis Hamilton will join the Maranello outfit on a multi-year deal that would see him race for the Italian team alongside Charles Leclerc until the end of the 2026 season at least.