Lewis Hamilton unaffected by Ferrari ‘pressure’ that Sebastian Vettel hated during his time with the team

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Lewis Hamilton’s debut season with Ferrari has not been the dream start he wanted, with the Briton crashing out of his last race at the Dutch Grand Prix.

It was a tough blow for Hamilton after a difficult weekend, in which he spun twice in Friday practice and was beaten by teammate Charles Leclerc in qualifying.

Hamilton admitted that his crash was ‘very unusual’ because it occurred early in the race. However, replays appeared to show that he lost control on the wet painted areas of Turn 3, which put him offline and in the trajectory of the barriers exiting the corner.

At the previous race in Hungary, Hamilton cast a downbeat figure when speaking to media, indicating that he is not happy with how things are going.

Driving for Ferrari can bring a lot of pressure because of the history of the brand and its racing heritage. However, former Alpine team principal Marcin Budkowski believes Hamilton is unaffected by one area that often irked Sebastian Vettel when speaking on the F1 Nation podcast.

Lewis Hamilton unaffected by pressure from Italian media

Italian media can be unforgiving when results are not coming in at Ferrari, and it is likely to be difficult for Hamilton at their home race in Monza now that he has to serve a five-place grid penalty.

Vettel was scathed at Ferrari and branded the media attention a “burden” in his final years (via grandprix.com). Budkowski, who worked with Hamilton at McLaren, believes this is unlikely to impact Hamilton’s on-track performance.

“The pressure is huge from the Italian press and from the Italian society in general. I don’t think Lewis cares about that. I’ve worked with Lewis a little bit at McLaren many years ago,” said Budkowski.

“He has evolved a lot. I worked with him in his first years in Formula 1. I don’t think he’s at the stage where, what the Corriere della Sera writes about him is keeping him awake at night.

“I think he wants this to be a success. He wants this to be the culmination of his career. It’s more difficult than everybody expected.”

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Lewis Hamilton faces difficult home race for Ferrari at Monza

Monza is always the headline race for Ferrari because it is close to their Maranello headquarters and it is where thousands of Tifosi fans congregate.

Leclerc heads into the race weekend defending his sensational win from last season, when Ferrari introduced upgrades that transformed the second half of their season.

Hamilton’s grid penalty after a yellow flag infringement before the race had started in Zandvoort is unlikely to instil confidence that he can earn a podium.

Ferrari are also expected to struggle in the high speed after they were among the slowest in Zandvoort, although they were quick in the slow speed corners, which might enable them to gain time at Monza’s tricky chicanes.