Upbeat Hamilton, Leclerc aim to ‘bring Ferrari back to the top’

The 2025 Formula 1 season was one to forget for Ferrari, as the legendary Italian team came away empty-handed in terms of race wins and eventually finished fourth in the Constructors’ Championship.

The much-hyped return of Lewis Hamilton fizzled out as the seven-time world champion struggled with his car throughout the wretched season. To be fair to the Briton, his teammate and seasoned Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc too did not exactly set the racetracks on fire, only managing second-place finishes.

But this is 2026, with all-new engines, battery systems and smaller, lighter cars and already, the Prancing Horse is giving positive vibes on the track. So much so, that Leclerc was left feeling “very excited” for the upcoming season following his opening run at the Barcelona Shakedown, with the Monegasque hoping that the opportunity posed by the new regulations can help to “bring Ferrari back to the top”.

“I’m very excited,” the 28-year-old told formula1.com. “I’m very excited to see what the others have in store and when we start pushing a little bit more to see where we are compared to the others.

“This year is a big opportunity for every team to do something different and to maybe gain a bigger advantage than what we’ve seen in the last few years.

“I hope we are the team that will manage to make the difference but, wherever we start, we will push at the maximum to try and bring Ferrari back to the top. It’s been quite a few years, so I hope that this one is ours.”

Hamilton also shared his reflections following his time behind the wheel of the SF-26 in Barcelona, with the seven-time World Champion admitting that the changing weather conditions posed some difficulties.

“Very challenging today, because it started raining at 10.30am – obviously Charles had a little bit of dry running then it’s been wet all afternoon,” Hamilton explained. “Figuring out how to get the tyres working was really productive – I think we got 120 laps or something like that.

“Given it’s in the wet conditions and we had a red flag, I think that’s pretty solid, so I’m really proud of everyone back at the factory for getting the car to this point. We got a lot of information on the car today – we definitely need to keep it up, [there’s] lots and lots to do, but a good first day.”

In terms of how satisfying it was for the team to get a solid number of laps on the board straightaway, the Briton added: “I mean, it could be so much worse.

“It’s such a big regulation change, so to get through the day without too many major… there were no major issues, it’s just small little increments that we’re trying to improve on. I think it’s great. As I said, we just need to try and get some more days like this.”