Otmar Szafnauer on the challenges of Lewis Hamilton's adaptation

      On The Team Principal Podcast, former Racing Point/Aston Martin and Alpine team principal Otmar Szafnauer spoke about the problems Lewis Hamilton encountered after moving to Ferrari…

      Otmar Szafnauer: "I'm not surprised. To me Lewis is the best driver of the period when I worked in Formula 1 — fast and successful — but I'm not surprised that adapting to a new team, especially when it's Ferrari, takes a long time, particularly after he spent many years at another team.

      At Mercedes he knew everything. The entire technical team, the strategist, the technical director, the designers, the chief engineer — he knew everything and everyone. It's like a football team; I don't want to compare, but it's a bit similar. When you play five, six, seven years in the same team, you don't have to think about who to pass to — with your eyes closed you know where everyone is. But it doesn't happen like that straight away; you first have to gel.

      In the first year playing with a new team you have to look for players on the field, you're forced to spend time doing that, and the attack loses its sharpness. It's the same in Formula 1. Having been with a team for a long time, you know how it will react to a particular situation, what strategy it will choose, how everyone around you will perform. Without that it's impossible to compete at the highest level. And to fully integrate into a new team you need patience and time.

      I expect that by the end of the season he will be bringing the team roughly as many points as Charles, and that over time, as he gets to know the team, their results will become closer."