MIAMI, Florida — On one end of the paddock at Hard Rock Stadium Mercedes was celebrating Kimi Antonelli’s first pole position in Formula 1, as the young driver captured P1 for Saturday’s F1 Sprint race at the Miami Grand Prix.
On the other end of the paddock, the driver whose seat Antonelli filled at the start of the 2025 season was looking for answers yet again, and struggling to find them.
“It was a better session. P1 was probably a bit better, the car was a bit better, the car was a bit nicer to drive. We are just lacking speed, but we just keep working from there,” said Lewis Hamilton after qualifying seventh.
The Ferrari driver conceded that he was not optimistic about fighting forward when the lights go out on Saturday.
“I think all the cars ahead are faster. I don’t know what else to say.”
Asked whether he and the team could make some improvements ahead of qualifying for the Miami Grand Prix, which comes later in the day on Saturday, Hamilton outlined that there are always “ideas” available.
“There are always ideas. Whether or not they will be right or not…there’s definitely learnings to be taken – set-up changes, how the car behaved, there’s definitely work to do to pick up speed going into the rest of the weekend.”
On the other side of the garage Charles Leclerc — who qualified just ahead of Hamilton in P6 — shared his own frustration with the “annoying” lack of pace from the SF-25.
“Bad,” began Leclerc when asked how he felt qualifying went. “The lap was good, but the pace is just not at all there for now, so it’s a bit annoying but it’s the way it is for now.
“I’ll try my best tomorrow to try to do something special with the start, but to be honest, there’s not much room for improvement today. It was just… that’s the pace of the car,” continued Leclerc.
“It’s every corner, really, so it’s not like we are particularly weak in one type of corner. Yes, the slow-speed seems to be a little bit more of our weakness, but it changes from one weekend to the other, so it’s just not great.”
After praising Antonelli, Ferrari Team Principal Frederic Vasseur sounded a bit more optimistic than his two drivers.
“Congratulations to Kimi for his mega lap, he did a very good job and he is a long way ahead,” began Vasseur in the team’s post-session media report.
“Behind him the situation was much closer and we were not far from the guys in front of us but that’s not enough, as we found it difficult to put everything together. There were some mistakes and we have struggled with the car balance and that comes at a price in today’s Formula 1.
“Tomorrow in the Sprint race, tire management and degradation will come into play and it could be another story.”
The issue might be the traffic that both Hamilton and Leclerc will face. Speaking with the media on Thursday, Leclerc stressed how difficult it is to run in dirty air this season. Hamilton’s win in the F1 Sprint race at the Chinese Grand Prix, for example, came when he qualified up front.
Running in traffic is a much different story, according to Leclerc.
“It’s interesting because these cars are very, very difficult to drive in dirty [air], especially this year,” said Leclerc on Thursday during his media session. “We see more differences than in the past, and so yeah, that makes a difference to try and find free air and use your pace in order to have a strategic advantage later on in the race.”
If Leclerc or Hamilton can find that free air, they may have a shot on Saturday in the F1 Sprint race.
But finding it might be tough, given the cars that will start in front of them.