Lewis Hamilton could be jumping ship to Ferrari “at the right time,” suspects Christian Horner 

After the final three races of 2024, seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton will be all set to join Ferrari for the 2025 season. Red Bull Racing's Christian Horner has now claimed that the timing is right for Hamilton to jump ship to the Italian team.

Although Hamilton and Mercedes-AMG were a force to be reckoned with in the past decade, implementation of the 2022 aero regulation saw both decline rapidly to the midfield. With not much progress visible in 2023, the 39-year-old went ahead and signed a multi-year contract with Ferrari from 2025 onwards.

While the move felt hasty to some at the start of the 2024 season, the rise in form of the Italian team throughout the year seems to have justified Hamilton's decision. In an interview with TalkSPORT, Red Bull team principal Horner appreciated Hamilton's timing to switch teams.

"It will be very interesting to see how Lewis acclimatizes to life at Ferrari. He’s obviously coming out of a very comfortable environment, one that he knows very well over the last 10 years, or more than 10 years. So that’ll be a change for him," Horner said.

"But you know, Ferrari is a team that looks like they’re picking momentum up, so for sure a driver of Lewis’s quality is always going to be a challenge. And I think, Ferrari, he could be just jumping at the right time. I think he’s obviously seen things that he’s chosen to change teams for because he believes in the future of Ferrari, so that’s going to be fascinating to see how that plays out," he added.

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"I need to look at the next generation" - Toto Wolff on Lewis Hamilton nearing the end of his 'shelf life' in F1

With Lewis Hamilton parting ways with Mercedes-AMG at the end of 2024, team boss Toto Wolff shared a rather controversial opinion on the seven-time world champion.

The Austrian team principal spoke about the same during a recent High Performance podcast.

"There's a reason why we only signed a one-plus-one-year contract. We're in a sport where cognitive sharpness is extremely important," Toto Wolff said, highlighting Lewis Hamilton's age.

"I believe everyone has a shelf life. I need to look at the next generation. It's the same in football. Managers like Sir Alex Ferguson or Pep Guardiola. They anticipated it in the performance of their top stars and brought in junior players that drove the team for the next years," he added.

Wolff's statement regarding Hamilton was shared on X by Autosport. Here's a look at the post, captioned:

"Toto Wolff has spoken about losing Lewis Hamilton to Ferrari"

As for the 2025 season, Mercedes-AMG has signed Italian F2 driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli as the replacement for Hamilton.