Hamilton focuses on "experimenting" in pre-season testing

F1 Grand Prix, GP Qatar, Losail International Circuit

Having completed his first official day with Ferrari, seven-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton insisted that he focused on "experimenting" as he got his first taste for his new car at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Ferrari completed a total of 141 laps (763 kilometres) on the first of the only three days of testing prior to the start of the 2025 season. Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc split the eight hours of track time in the SF-25. The two drivers ran the same programme, centred on the usual tests for a new car on its first run, rather than on performance.

Hamilton was first out on track in the morning, with his car fitted with aero rakes for the first few laps to take measurements, while running the C2 tyre. The team focused on a thorough mapping to get an in-depth picture of the whole car, as well as checking the correlation between the on-track data and that gathered in the simulator over the past few months.

Hamilton also ran the C3 tyre with different aero configurations and fuel loads, as well as doing some practice starts and pit stops. He completed 70 laps (379 kilometres) with a best time of 1’31”834, set on the C3s.

In the afternoon, Leclerc ran an almost identical programme to his team-mate, starting on the C2 tyres before switching to C3, continuing with the mapping work and getting to grips with the SF-25, but with no thought of performance.

He also ran various fuel loads, as the team gathered data from several areas of the car, ending the day with some practice starts. The only hold up to proceedings was down to a general power failure that affected the whole circuit shortly after 17h00, which meant track activity was halted for almost an hour. The decision was therefore taken by the FIA and the teams to extend the session by an hour, with the chequered flag at 20h00, to make up for the time lost. The Monegasque’s best time, from a total of 71 laps (384 kilometres) was a 1'30"878, set on C3 tyres.

"Our focus right now is on experimenting with different things, gathering as much data as possible and getting familiar with the car, and we’ve already learned a lot. It’s too early to really understand performance, but everything feels good and as a team we’re working on the best way to optimise each run.

"There’s more to do over the next few days to get through our programme and understand the car to the best of our ability, but right now I'm looking forward to getting out there again tomorrow.

Reflecting on his first day with the SF-25, Leclerc noted: "It feels good to be back on track. The whole team put a lot of effort into the SF-25 project over the winter break, so it’s exciting to finally get down to work with it.

"It’s always a positive to have a smooth session without anything unexpected happening in terms of your run plan, although of course, it’s still too early to come to any conclusions about our performance. We’re going to analyse our data from today and make use of what we learn tonight when we start work again tomorrow."