F1 returns on August 31 with the Dutch Grand Prix.

I refuse for that to be the case' – Lewis Hamilton determined not to lose out on a championship with Ferrari

Ferrari have broken a ‘trusted’ promise to Lewis Hamilton during the 2025 season, an Italian journalist has claimed.

Hamilton is currently 42 points behind team-mate Charles Leclerc in the Drivers’ Championship after 13 races.

He finished 12th in the most recent Grand Prix in Hungary last month, and described himself as ‘useless’ after qualifying in the same position.

The seven-time world champion has, however, been defended by team principal Frederic Vasseur, who cited that it has taken time for Hamilton to adapt to driving under Ferrari power for the first time in his F1 contract.

Ferrari have struggled for pace all season, with Leclerc’s pole position in Hungary followed by a dismal final stint that saw him finish in fourth.

Neither Leclerc nor Hamilton have won a Grand Prix in 2025, though the latter did win the sprint race in China with a dominant lights-to-flag drive.

Hamilton is said to have ‘technical guarantees’ written in to his contract for 2026, as per Formu1a.uno, with next season bringing with it a raft of power unit-related regulation changes.

But Italian journalist and author Leo Turrini, speaking on Sky Italy’s ‘Race Anatomy’ show, believes that Ferrari will have ‘promised’ Hamilton a ‘top car’ this season as well.

“It’s not that someone like Hamilton chooses Ferrari because someone promises him [Adrian] Newey [who has joined Aston Martin as a technical partner],” Turrini began (via F1 Oversteer)

“They obviously promised him a top car, and he trusted them, first and foremost.

“Vasseur, his mentor in his youth. Without Fred in Maranello, Lewis wouldn’t have come. As for Leclerc, he has been betting on the Scuderia since he was a teenager. If he doesn’t make it, he’ll try elsewhere. But with whom?”

Lewis Hamilton’s 2006 GP2 Silverstone Race 2 victory. Audacious. Sublime. Mesmerising. #F1

Vasseur was the team principal of the ART Grand Prix team when Hamilton drove for the team in GP2 in 2006.

The Brit won five races that season, including the sprint and feature race double at Nurburgring and Silverstone, on the way to winning the Drivers’ Championship and earning a promotion to F1 with McLaren for 2007.