Hamilton says Ferrari lost podium chance in Zandvoort
NXTbets Pro | Published On: August 23, 2026
Hamilton qualifying
Lewis Hamilton said Ferrari left a podium chance on the table at Zandvoort because the team could not get its tires up to temperature fast enough in qualifying. Hamilton called the problem “nuts” and said he and Charles Leclerc each needed two warm-up laps before the tires reached the right window. Even then, he said the car still was not ready for Turn 1 after an out-lap and a prep lap, which left him short on confidence as he turned in. Hamilton said other teams handled tire preparation better than Ferrari, a gap that showed up in the one-lap fight for grid position. Ferrari made setup changes after the Sprint, and Hamilton said the car felt much happier in qualifying. He still could not convert that improvement into a front-row challenge. Hamilton qualified fifth in Dutch Grand Prix qualifying, 0.331 seconds behind pole-sitter Lando Norris in Q3, with Leclerc sixth. Fred Vasseur said fifth and sixth fell below Ferrari’s expectations. Ferrari also saved a fresh set of Soft tires for Sunday’s 72-lap race, a move that pointed to better long-run pace than qualifying speed. Leclerc backed that read of the car, saying it favored race pace over one-lap pace. That left Ferrari trying to balance short-run execution with Sunday flexibility, and qualifying never gave Hamilton the track position he wanted.
Ferrari strategy
Ferrari’s problems carried over into the race, where Hamilton quickly became frustrated with the team’s strategy. He believed Ferrari was wasting time by waiting too long to swap him with Leclerc, and he said he had better pace and fresher tires than his teammate. Leclerc initially ignored a pit-stop instruction from Ferrari, and the team delayed team orders as the race unfolded. Hamilton kept pressing the point on team radio and asked whether he was being used as a guinea pig. The message from the cockpit was clear. He wanted Ferrari to act sooner and put the faster car in front. Ferrari eventually brought both cars in together under a virtual safety car and double-stacked them, a move that limited some damage but did not erase the lost time from earlier in the race. The sequence underlined how Ferrari spent much of Sunday reacting instead of controlling the flow at the front. It also showed how the team’s choice to keep a fresh Soft set for the race became only part of the picture. Tire life mattered, but so did timing and track position. Hamilton said the pace was there to do more, yet Ferrari’s calls left him waiting while the race slipped through key windows. The strategy debate turned into the defining element of his afternoon, with each delay making the path to a stronger finish harder to find.
Hamilton postrace
Hamilton still could not get past George Russell late in the race and finished fourth, just ahead of Leclerc. Afterward, he pushed back on Ferrari’s view that he had simply been unlucky. Hamilton said Ferrari had lost time earlier and that cost the team a possible podium. That was the clearest summary of his view of the day. Ferrari had speed, but it did not put that speed in the right place often enough. Hamilton pointed to the qualifying struggles first, then to the way the race unfolded. The car felt better after the Sprint changes, but the team still spent too much of qualifying fighting tire temperature. In the race, Hamilton said he had better pace and fresher tires than Leclerc at key moments, but Ferrari did not use that edge soon enough. The late double-stack under the virtual safety car helped, yet it came after the time loss had already built up. Hamilton’s fourth-place finish kept Ferrari close to the podium, but not on it. Leclerc followed him home, which left Ferrari with both cars in the top six and a result that still fell short of what the team expected. For Hamilton, the Dutch Grand Prix became a missed chance built on small delays that added up. For Ferrari, it was another race where the raw ingredients were present and the execution did not match them.
