Lewis Hamilton preparing for awkward Toto Wolff conversation after Japanese GP | F1 | Sport

Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he faces an awkward conversation with team principal Toto Wolff as he prepares for life as a Ferrari driver in 2025. The seven-time world champion has been with Mercedes for over a decade, but will soon need to be phased out of the team’s preparations for next season.

Hamilton’s move, which came as a complete shock to the majority of the motorsport community, was announced at the start of February, giving team principal Wolff considerable notice as he looks to replace the speed and feedback expertise offered by the 39-year-old.

However, this also means that Hamilton will likely be shunned from meetings discussing the team’s 2025 challenger from the very offset this year, to avoid a conflict of interests between the technical team and the future Ferrari driver. 

Addressing his thoughts about the upcoming move, Hamilton said: “At some stage, I will have to start the conversation with Toto. I’ve never been in this position at this time of the year. So I’m not quite sure how to navigate it but right now I want to finish on a high here so all my energy is going into this. Of course, there’s excitement for the future.”

Team-mate George Russell will be left to pick up the mantle as team leader when Hamilton makes the switch to Maranello over the winter, and the 26-year-old believes that the departure of the seven-time champion could have a silver lining for Mercedes.

“He’s done so many great things,” Russell explained. « He’s been here for so long and we’re kind of stuck at the moment. So I think this change is positive for him and positive for Mercedes because it gives us the possibility of starting from a clean sheet.”

With Hamilton unlikely to see the full picture of Mercedes’ development plans for the remainder of the season, there will need to be some difficult internal conversations. The potential awkwardness behind the scenes at Mercedes this season was something that Max Verstappen predicted after the switch was announced.

“To announce something that big that early in the season I think for sure, for the rest of the year is a bit… I would say a little bit awkward,” he said. “Even though you’ve had a lot of success together as a team, you can’t be included into everything anymore.”