Ferrari should start prioritizing Lewis Hamilton over Charles Leclerc if it wants to interfere in the fight for the Formula 1 title in 2026. This is the opinion of Rob Smedley, former team engineer, given the current championship situation.
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At the Dutch GP, Hamilton showed dissatisfaction with a strategic decision by Ferrari. The Briton caught up with Leclerc during the race while following a different strategy and asked several times to overtake his teammate to avoid losing time.
Ferrari ended up calling Leclerc to the pits a few laps later. Hamilton finished the race in fourth, just behind George Russell, and is currently tied on points with his former teammate, 59 points behind Kimi Antonelli in the standings.
For Smedley, Ferrari needs to set a preference if it really wants to influence the championship fight. In an appearance on the High Performance Racing Podcast, he stated: “My opinion from the start has always been that if Ferrari wants to have an impact on this world championship, it needs to support Hamilton.”
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The former engineer acknowledged that such a decision would be difficult for Leclerc’s side in the garage but emphasized that the team’s collective interests must prevail: “As hard as this is for Charles and for the team on that side of the garage, they all work for Ferrari,” he said.
Smedley also assessed that Hamilton has shown the best performance between the two drivers this year, and that Ferrari should act together to take points from Mercedes: “Lewis had the best streak and did the best job. And I think if they are going to steal points from Mercedes, they will do it as a team,” he added.
According to him, even without consistently having the best car, Ferrari needs to take advantage of occasions when it is competitive to maximize Hamilton’s results: “They don’t have the best car consistently, but on some occasions they had the best car, and they need to make that count, ensuring Lewis wins. On all other occasions, they should just ensure they maximize Lewis’s points,” Smedley concluded.
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