Hamilton reminded of Ricciardo failure in major Ferrari challenge

Lewis Hamilton has been reminded of Daniel Ricciardo's failure to adapt to his new McLaren machine as he tries to get up to speed at Ferrari. 

Hamilton has undertaken multiple Ferrari tests in old machinery ahead of his first race with the team next month to adjust to the new systems he will face in 2025.

Throughout his F1 career, the former go-karter from Stevenage has only ever used Mercedes power, and spent the last 12 years at the Mercedes works team. 

In moving to Ferrari, one major adjustment will be losing the Mercedes muscle memory, and getting accustomed to Ferrari's power unit systems, the steering wheel and the pedals in particular.

When Ricciardo moved from Renault to McLaren in 2021, he struggled with the braking and turn-in characteristics of the McLaren, eventually being axed in 2022, with his career never truly recovering and coming to an end in mid-2024 after a stint at AlphaTauri/Racing Bulls.

Observing the challenge Hamilton will come across after so many years of Mercedes systems, Anthony Davidson also spoke of Kimi Raikkonen's struggles at adapting to the Scuderia.

"The controls like the pedals, the steering wheel of the car [are things he will have to adapt to], Sky Sports F1's Davidson exclusively told RacingNews365. 

"We've heard lots of different drivers in the past, like Kimi when he went to Ferrari complaining about the steering compared to his McLaren days. 

"Daniel Ricciardo, when he moved to McLaren and struggled with the brakes, he never got to grips with it. 

"Sometimes, it will never feel like the car you want it to in terms of controls, no matter how much you work with the engineers to try and rectify it. 

"Hopefully, for his sake, he is lucky and it all feels intuitive, it feels like the Mercedes he is used to and he can hit the ground running, but there is always the chance that when a driver moves team, it never quite feels like home for some reason."

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