Has Hamilton’s ‘historic day’ put Ferrari in title fight? – Barcelona-Catalunya GP Review

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1:17Enjoy everyday protection against scuffs and wear with a smooth, washable finish. We're made of colors. And with Valspar Ultra, you can reflect that pride of culture you have inside on every wall of your home. Available at Lowe's. It's more history for Hamilton. Lewis Hamilton wins a Grand Prix for Ferrari. A legend forged in silver resumes in red. Let's go. For the Ferrari. For the Ferrari. And to the fans, thank you for continuing to remind me who I am. Even one of the greatest ever can fail, can doubt and can go back stronger. I think that today he was fighting against his fears. I feel Lewis has really pushed them to not be afraid.

2:05He smells blood and if the blood is there, he will go for it. I see Fred as an enabler of what Lewis can achieve here. I think he's changing a little bit the history and the mentality of Ferrari. Although George has closed the gap, do you think he's actually left Barcelona slightly worried? Yes, very much. I'm sure that he's not happy right now.

2:34Lewis Hamilton is back. Welcome everyone to Spain for F1 Nation's review of the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix. I'm Tom Clarkson and joining me in the paddock, or perhaps I should say in the Ferrari motorhome, is ESPN's Albert Fabrega and Brazilian journalist Julian Sarasoli. What an extraordinary day, guys, for Hamilton, for Ferrari, I think we can say for Formula One as well. Can we start by getting your reactions to what happened? What can I say about this? I wouldn't say it was unexpected because this win has been coming closer and closer and closer. It's not coming out of the blue. Lewis is second in the championship.

3:20But I didn't expect it to be today. I thought today was going to be all about tyre degradation and Mercedes was going to walk with it. And then since the beginning, since the first stint, it wasn't. and then it was becoming clearer and clearer that Lewis was doing exactly what he needed to do to win. I don't think he needed the VSC to win and it's just a remarkable moment and his emotions just, it goes on to show that even one of the greatest ever in all sports can fail, can doubt and can go back stronger. Yeah, 100 % agree. It's not only the race, I think the whole weekend's been fantastic for the sport, for Luis.

4:04I admire Luis as I admire the 22 drivers. But, you know, especially when he was a year ago in a very difficult moment to see how he has recovered that moment and he's winning for his own merits, not because of third factors, because I agree with Julien what you said about the virtual safety car. He was deserving this. And the thing that I appreciate very much is that he was going for it since the start with the soft tyres. It's a statement of what I want to do in this race. It's not just to take the podium. I want to win this race and he achieved it. So it's very good for the sport, I would say, for the Formula 1.

4:45As a fan, it's good for everyone. It was a very emotional win. Let's hear from the man himself. How do you find the right words to express an emotion that's beyond your wildest dreams? You know, it's I truly believed in my decision and joining Ferrari. I truly believed what this team could achieve, what we could achieve together. I know it started out with lots of excitement and then lots of doubt and lots of negativity that followed through a whole year. You know, I really feel like my fans really rescued me last year. My family also and friends that stuck with me through it all and started into a new season, a new year.

5:25who have lots and lots of changes in the background enabled me to get to this position I'm in today. And I just feel a lot of gratitude, a lot of pride, and very, very proud of the people that I work with. After a year like last year, there was definitely moments that I was like, maybe it is true that, you know, when you get to a certain point, you lose it. But I've proven that you don't. I wouldn't be in this team without Fred. Fred is the one that made it happen. I think last year was really, really, really tough. for him to deal with me coming was a big shock to the system because I am very very vocal uh if I see something that I don't think is right I push but he continued to believe continued to be a good friend and really supportive and you know ultimately really listened at the end I had to really ask really really ask for some of the changes and he enabled them to happen which I'm forever grateful for because this wouldn't have happened without those changes so uh big big thank you to him i think there was a lot of relief in his voice listening to him then after everything he's been through over over the last 18 months and not only from him uh i got to hear the total wolf say i feel relieved for him to to come back winning for him and for fred as well instead of fred annoys me sometimes but he's my friend and i'm i'm glad that they got through a lot of really bad stuff it's what lewis has done by going to ferrari is just he didn't need to do this he didn't need to take this step and he wanted to as you said about the race he went for it he went for it with this decision as well and it was not an easy one and it's it's just uh it's just amazing and that's why it was a very long press conference he deserved it but albert there's a lovely symmetry because it was 30 years ago here at the circuit de catalonia as it was called then that michael schumacher won his first race for ferrari heavy rain today it was a heavy sun i would say luckily we are in a motor ferrari motorhome with a nice aircon now but yeah there is a lot of a lot of similar points on on that maybe a bit different but it was a challenge as as she said it was a challenge to come to Ferrari.

7:44We know that Ferrari has not been capable to win with champions like Sebastian Vettel, like Fernando Alonso. So it's not easy. It's a completely different team than the others. Obviously, being used to work with British Embryman and going to an Italian, a proper Italian concept like Ferrari is built from, it was a massive challenge for him. And I think the last year he showed to us that he is so emotional in everything he does. And he was capable to record himself. It's not a matter only that he is now connected with the car, that he feels better with the generation of cars. It's not only that.

8:26I think he was capable to rebuild himself again from zero and this year to be to smile and to compete. That is the thing as a driver you want. He only had one complaint and when he made a comparison with Michael, that Michael's cockpit was red and his is white. And in his dreams, he would be driving and seeing red all over him and he sees white from where he stands. That's the only complaint. You mentioned that he started on the soft tyre and that he was aggressive and wanted to win this race from the start. I feel there is a significance behind him starting on the soft tyre because I think there's been a period here at Ferrari where they might have been a bit afraid to do something different like that at the start.

9:16All the cars around him were on the medium tyre. But I feel Lewis has really pushed them to not be afraid, to go for the Macarena wing, to change the brakes, to be adventurous with the design, to go be aggressive with the soft tyre. Do you guys agree that that's significant? It is. It is. I think that Ferrari still have this difference between them and the other teams where the consequences of having a mistake like this could affect the whole scuderia. I think that in this sense, Fred has done a good job taking weight of the things that are not relevant for the team and whatever is said outside.

10:03I think that he's trying to introduce to the team that they have to be a little bit away of what is going on away of the team or outside the team and what the people say about it and be confident with their work. And I think that having a man like Lewis Hamilton that has been one of the greatest of the sport within the team, it gives that confidence to them to do this kind of strategies, saying, OK, well, let's go for it. And if it doesn't work, nothing happens. We will be fighting for the podium anyway. But giving them the opportunity to win, I think, is enough to take the risk. And they're doing it.

10:44I see Fred as an enabler, enabler of what Lewis can achieve here. In his first day at Ferrari, he went to his office and there was all the newspapers from the day before, from the morning probably. And he said, from tomorrow onwards, I don't want this. I don't want to know what others are talking about this team. What matters is what's inside this team. And I think this leads to decisions like this. It leads to, let's just do our best here and not be afraid of what the papers will say or what we are going to say in the podcast or something like that. It all comes together. And having Lewis, a guy who has won so much, telling the guys, just go for it.

11:31And having a boss saying, OK, let's go for it. If we fail, we fail trying. and of course they are in also a much better position than Mercedes to try something like that because they are far off from the championship, they don't have power and that is still a problem and nothing that has happened today has made them have more power in their engine, right? It doesn't solve their problem but at least they won, they got this first step they are on a different kind of path than Mercedes is I think that Fred Basel has been the first team member of Ferrari who has said that the engine is not powerful enough.

12:06I don't know. That would never have come out of a Ferrari. Never happened before. And Dinaldus is all. He's been brave since the first race of this season. Our engine, our power unit is not powerful enough. So I think that never happened that before in Ferrari. Why don't we listen to the boss now? This is Fred Vasseur. You know that we had up and down the last 18 months and sometimes it was tough, but it's, I think, a good reward for everybody when I say everybody, the first one is Lewis and the team in Maranello and the team on track after 18 months to be able to win and to have this kind of race today it's not the target, I want to win more but it's a good milestone and a good reward for everybody He praised you, he thanked you after the race for believing in him and sticking by him during the difficult times last year Yeah, but we are working as a team, including Charles, including Lewis, the guys in the factory, the guys on track, that we have to react in the positive and negative moment as a group, not as individuals.

13:11You say you want to win more. You had the fastest racing car today on a track that is a real car test. How much confidence does that give you? It's a good one, but honestly I think this season is a bit different. It will be all based on the capacity to develop and to bring upgrades. It means that we will do a full reset soon when the others and us, we will bring a new package on track and it will be, perhaps today we had an advantage, but perhaps in one week it will be different. We talk about what a facilitator Fred is. I thought it was interesting in that short interview just how even in what is probably the highlight of his Ferrari career so far, seeing Lewis Hamilton win in red, he's still very measured.

13:56You know, he's always said, I don't want to get too excited when we win, I don't want to get too low when we lose. and he's just proven that. Yeah, and he's a racer because he's a man whose all his career has been related to motorsport in the GP2 and Formula 3, then in Formula 1, but he's a proper racer. He's a man of the motorsport, a man of the motorsport and he knows that these ups and downs happen and the emotions that are very high in a day like today, it can be very low in the day after or the race after. So balancing all these high points and low points, I think it gives you the moment to, it gives you energy and it gives you the calm and the quiet situation in order to make the team work on the right way.

14:46And yeah, I think he's doing well. He's doing well. And I think he's changing a little bit the history and the mentality of Ferrari. This is important because there are some drivers that are changing the sport or changing the mentality of a team principal like him, that he's coming alone. It's not different than Jean-Tot that arrived there with a lot of engineers, with relevant people and changed the whole board of the company. Fred Basset arrived there alone. He said, I'm coming. And when he said that Lewis was going to come to the team and he is changing slowly, but on the right way, the way that Ferrari is working as a team and is achieving very good things.

15:31This was win number 106 for Lewis. What does a win in red mean for Lewis Hamilton's legacy in this sport? Well, it means winning in three different teams is not easy. I don't know if there are many drivers who have achieved that. Mainly when no one was saying that he could achieve it with the Scuderia. No one was thinking, okay, this year is going to be Lewis Hamilton year. He's going to recover himself. He was more comfortable with the car. But from that point to win races and to beat both Mercedes, I think there was a long distance. But then after the two or three first races, we saw that he has the capability to achieve the pace enough.

16:19He was happy with the car. He was connected. everything was in place with even that power unit but I think that it reaches here in Barcelona very very emotional emotional moment when you see that him achieving the result mainly with a car that shouldn't perform that well here for example so I think it has double value. The thing with Lewis is that I can only imagine that maybe tonight he's going to be thinking oh oh, this is great. I finally won with Ferrari. And tomorrow he's going to be thinking, okay, what else can I do? How far can I go? Can I fight for this championship? Can I become champion with Ferrari?

16:58I think he's already thinking that. Well, guys. Not even tomorrow. You know, with Kimi Antonelli not finishing this race, the gap is down to 41 points now between Lewis and Kimi. He was asked in the press conference, is it game on? And he was batting it away, not wanting to put pressure on him or the team, saying it's one race at a time. But when you look at the performance of the car and how many races we have left, I feel it's game on. Can we go into Silverstone soon? That is always a place where he's performing very well. Well, Toto was saying, I really don't want him to be fighting for the championship because I know him.

17:38I know if he can smell blood, he's going to go for it. And I really don't want to have him in this fight because I know what he's capable of. he's relentless isn't he yes yes and the good thing is that these situations it make us remember that it's not an easy job what the drivers are doing it means that you have to have everything on your side so it gives a special value for him winning this first race but I think that more are to come and when you see how his teammate is that Charles is not performing well and I'm pretty much sure that he's very disappointed with the result this weekend you think that Leo is now in another status and that he smells blued and the blued is there and it's red of course like the Ferrari he will go for it and I have no doubt of that there will be a difficult situation for him again that happens always but when there is an opportunity he always takes it This episode is sponsored by Lisa You know we spend so much time talking about performance in Formula 1 the tiny details that can make a difference over the course of a race weekend.

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21:39the juxtaposition of lewis celebrating on a sunday and and charlaclair saying how ashamed he was his word not mine of his crash in qualifying it's a really difficult moment i feel this for charl i think he's generous enough to be pleased for lewis and for the team that they're winning again for the first time in a couple of years but how does he drag himself back into into the conversation funnily enough going back to fred fred was saying that i'm less worried about child now than i was two weeks ago that's what he said in the press conference after the race um actually child drove a good race everything went downwards uh yesterday but at least the what the team is feeling is that this weekend was better for him let's remember that he was actually doing better than Lewis until qualifying and Lewis throughout this weekend I'm I saw him after FP3 leaving the track and I thought what what's wrong why why is he leaving the track and I I thought about saying oh Lewis what are you doing here just to make a joke but He looked tense.

22:56And then he said afterwards, I went to my motorhome because I wanted to put my act together. It was not as if he destroyed Charles for the whole weekend. And then it was only, it was Saturday qualifying and everything went wrong for Charles. And then his race was actually a good race. So I think there's more to come from Charles. He just made an important change with the breaks this weekend. I think that the same process that Lewis needed to get to this point here, I think that's the process that Charles is going through right now. How much has Charles learned technically this weekend about the breaks?

23:34Because there aren't any really big stops here in Barcelona. No, no, definitely not. But not sure if he already tested in the preseason. I'm not sure about that. But anyway, he needed it mentally, I think. More than a technical thing, I think he needed it mentally, just to be sure that he has the same car as his teammate. I think, you know, the talent is there. He hasn't forgot to drive the car. So I think it's more a mental job what Charles has to do to recover the confidence in himself, to see what he's doing wrong because there's obviously something doing wrong and recover the speed that we have seen in past years.

24:17Maybe the thing that from Charles, I wouldn't say I don't like, but I see that this is penalizing him is that the low points, when he doesn't start, well, the Fridays, he's not capable to be on the pace and he's not confident with him and the car, he's not connected with the car. It's like it's difficult for him to recover that point where he sees that his teammate is quicker than him. I think he's entering in a moment that is difficult for him to release all this pressure and let all the speed going through. Albert, interestingly, isn't that what we saw from Lewis last year? And therefore Lewis...

24:54Sometimes, yes. ...then got them to make loads of changes, changes the race engineer, changes bits on the car, and it came back. I just wonder... Because you don't have answers to your questions. When you start asking questions, why I'm not that quick, or why I'm not capable to be connected with the car and showing my speed, and you don't have the answers, your answers yourself, you have to start looking around yourself, saying, well, maybe the problem is this or maybe the problem is that. And you're starting to change whatever you think is not right for you to see if that gives you the confidence to exploit all your speed.

25:33But it's difficult, it's difficult, definitely to recover that confidence. Let's talk about Mercedes now. One and three on the grid. When George Russell got away from the line in the lead, I think there were a lot of people, myself included, who thought, well, George Russell's got this in the bag. 25 of the 35 races here in Barcelona have been won from pole position. He's done the difficult bit. How surprised were you guys by the relative pace of Mercedes versus Ferrari? Yeah, I thought after a few laps with clean air, he was going to disappear. What seems to have happened, if we listen to George's radio, was that he was managing the tires and he was surprised and he was called with Lewis for the first stop.

26:18Like, oh, I had more tires here. You should have told me. What I think is that Mercedes, they just reacted to what Ferrari was doing instead of doing your own race. That's what happened in the first part of the race. And then in the second part of the race, they changed that. They realized, okay, Lewis is on the three stopper. We are not. And then they seem to not be very decisive with the strategy are we covering him him are we not covering him and i think that was bad for for george space first time in a while that ferrari have out strategized mercedes it's true right i'm actually being serious i'm agree for me there was an overreaction uh from them and it was clear for me from from the beginning before the race who was starting in soft side he was going to three stops and the others could go to a two stops following the simulator you know the simulator normally more or less are on the right way and matching what happened later but uh yeah for me it was another reaction moment because it you know they say okay let's cover Luis and and that's it and but I was hoping them to split the the strategy a little bit more maybe they could have uh Antonelli out for for longer I don't know, but then, again, if you do that, you create the tension within the team.

27:39And this is not good. So, not easy. But for me, it was an overreaction. If the tie was behaving good, that's what we understand from his comments. I think it was an overreaction moment, yes. I did wonder whether them battling, Kimi and George battling in that middle stint, would have cost them time in their battle with Lewis. But actually, George batted that away. How significant was it that Antonelli overtook Russell? Okay, he then retired less than a lap later or whatever. But to have that extra pace over George, do you think, although George has closed the gap to his teammate by 18 points, do you think he's actually left Barcelona slightly worried?

28:18Yes, very much. Because I'm pretty much sure that yesterday he was happy. He was, okay, I'm back. I didn't forget to drive a Formula One. I have the speed again here. and this is going to change from now onwards. And today, even him cutting points to his teammate, I think that that moment has an impact to his confidence, for sure. For sure, because he was quicker. And he overtook in a, not aggressive, but intense situation where even they touch. But yeah, I'm sure that he's not happy right now. Yeah, Toto is not happy as well. The fact that they touched. He said there are a few things we have to review.

29:02Imagine Toto. No, Barcelona again. No, no, no. Ten years on. Oh, my God. Going on turn three, side by side. No, no. Maybe another table just suffered another hit or something like that. But, yeah, Kimi did really well today, really aggressively. But what caught my attention was how Bono was trying to stop him, wasn't he? Bono was trying to know because of the track limits right track limits you know just stay there think about Lewis you know all the messages that the engineer says to try to calm him down but just to stop him from fighting and he went there and did it nothing can stop Kimi isn't that what we love about Kimi I was surprised about his radio message yesterday on Free Practice 3 I think when they sent him in traffic and he had not a shun, but a moment with Lance Stroll.

30:04That was QALY, wasn't it? Was it QALY? Or was he practiced three? Maybe he practiced three. And he went a little bit over Lance Stroll. And his message on the radio... Was strong. Was strong. And I said, whoa, that's not the nice Kimmy that we know. And he was getting upset with the wall. and then Bono was a little bit like calm down mate. Albert, that's a really interesting point. The change in mindset after five consecutive wins from Kimi Antonelli. We talk about Lewis Hamilton smelling blood, but I wonder whether the 19-year-old can see it, can see the championship. There's a change in mentality.

30:46You remember that moment where Toto went to him when he did a mistake. I don't know what's in Australia or Wednesday. Keep the confidence. I feel so confident. And Toto said to him, yes, keep the confidence. Keep the confidence. Look at the mistake, but keep the confidence. And the confidence is still there. And it's bigger. And it's growing with more confidence. And I think he's realizing that he has a big opportunity for him. So, yeah, I've seen a different Kimby this weekend. it was a very different circuit as well so i think on george's perspective he had everything on his side to prove that what happened in the the last two or three races is not going to happen again because we have the track temperature being a lot higher we have more energy on the tire we have everything then maybe we'll help a driver who was not as aggressive as antonelli in the car and this is it i just found something that that was him yesterday and today kimmy remember yesterday he said i think i've been over aggressive over one lap and everything and this guy 19 year old in one day he finds solutions and then when he could completely destroy the tires in a race like this 51 degrees of track temperature he does it yeah and i think george will be very we're talking about Lewis being relieved, George would be very relieved that he didn't lose out points this weekend.

32:24And Antonelli was pretty ill this weekend. Too much jumping in the harbour after the win in Monaco. Too much partying with the prince at the palace on Sunday night. I don't know what the reason is. But he was actually really ill. I don't know whether you heard him speak, but proper cold going on and didn't affect him at all in the cockpit. And he didn't do the free practice one. But, you know, it's a fact that they know. They know the car. The simulator is better and better. I don't know if Luis did simulator before this race. I didn't ask that. No, no, no, no. No simulator at all? He didn't have time?