The roar of the engines in São Paulo had barely faded, but the echoes of disappointment reverberated throughout the world of Formula 1. The Brazilian Grand Prix, often a stage for championship drama and spectacular comebacks, instead served as the scene for a catastrophic meltdown at the sport’s most legendary team, Scuderia Ferrari. The final straw in a season defined by missed opportunities, the Interlagos weekend saw the iconic Italian squad truly hit “rock bottom”, culminating in a devastating double retirement and, more alarmingly, an emotional confession from its star driver, Lewis Hamilton.

The world of F1 has rarely seen a transfer ignite such passionate, almost feverish, anticipation as Lewis Hamilton’s decision to join Ferrari. The premise was the stuff of Hollywood legend: the most successful driver in history, struggling through a late-career slump at Mercedes, moving to the storied Prancing Horse just as they were tipped to return to the summit of the sport. The script wrote itself: the veteran champion would claim a record-breaking eighth driver’s title, restoring Maranello’s glory in a “marriage made in heaven”. It was supposed to be a golden chapter, a final, emphatic statement on a peerless career.

Yet, as the season nears its ignominious close, the dream has curdled into a deep, agonizing frustration.

The False Dawn and the Swift Fall

The start of Hamilton’s Ferrari career was quickly dampened by a challenging Australian Grand Prix, but hope flickered back at the Chinese Grand Prix. In a performance that temporarily silenced his detractors, Hamilton secured his first victory for the team in the sprint race. The victory was quickly followed by a combative defense of his position and his team, as the seven-time champion lashed out at what he termed “yapping critics,” whom he accused of lacking appreciation and making “uneducated guesses” about the challenges of transitioning to a new team. “People just love to be negative at any opportunity,” he declared, displaying the fighting spirit that defined his legendary career.

It was a powerful, defiant message that promised a turning point. But the hope was extinguished in a spectacular and revealing fashion. Hamilton, along with teammate Charles Leclerc, was disqualified from the Chinese Grand Prix due to excessive plank wear. The sprint result, it turned out, was achieved with a car running too low, exposing a fundamental operational flaw rather than a genuine return to form. That brief window of triumph has since stood as “the only real high point for Ferrari and Hamilton this season”. The months that followed have been a dreary procession of missed opportunities, poor strategy, and disappointment.

The Brazilian Breakdown

The São Paulo Grand Prix provided the perfect, painful microcosm of Ferrari’s and Hamilton’s year. The veteran champion’s race was a cascading series of unfortunate events, beginning with contact from the Williams of Carlos Sainz on the first lap. The subsequent incident, however, was entirely Hamilton’s own: a misjudged, over-ambitious overtaking attempt on Franco Colapinto’s Alpine resulted in front wing damage. A subsequent 5-second penalty for the avoidable incident was compounded by a damaged floor, leaving him devoid of pace. Trailing the field from last position, Hamilton finally retired.

The sight of Hamilton making such an uncharacteristic, almost rookie-like, misjudgment—hitting the back of Colapinto while attempting an overtake—is a visible sign of the toll the season has taken. At 40 years old, the murmurs about his age and ability to compete are only “going to get louder” after mistakes like these. While one could chalk it up to a “bad season taking its toll on him”, the reality is that the seven-time champion has a significant amount to prove next year.

The disaster left him sixth in the Drivers’ Championship, a staggering 66 points behind his teammate, Leclerc. This season is now guaranteed to be the worst of his career, notably surpassing his 2022 campaign where, despite finishing sixth, he secured nine podiums. Hamilton has now set the unwanted record for the most races at Ferrari without a single podium, an achievement that is only likely to worsen before the season finale.

The Nightmare Confession

The immediate aftermath of the race saw a visibly worn and emotionally drained Lewis Hamilton deliver the season’s most stark and heartbreaking admission. His comments to the media stood in painful contrast to his fiery, defiant words in China:

“This is a nightmare and I’ve been living it for a while. The flip between the dream of driving for this amazing team and the nightmare of the results we’ve had, the ups and downs. It’s challenging.”

The word “nightmare” is profoundly significant. It strips away the veneer of corporate positivity and reveals the raw emotional cost of this disastrous campaign. For a driver who made a multi-year, multi-million dollar commitment to restore an empire, the realization that he is now navigating the most challenging and least rewarding phase of his career, being “comprehensively beaten by a teammate for the first time since 2011”, is a shattering experience.

Ferrari’s collective disappointment saw them fall from second to fourth place in the constructor standings with just three rounds remaining, underscoring the severity of their collapse. Hamilton acknowledged the team-wide struggle: “It’s obviously a disaster for us, a disappointment for everyone in the team,” he stated, before attempting to rally himself and the team.

Leclerc’s Unfair Fate and the Rulebook Debate

Hamilton was not the only victim of Ferrari’s Brazilian misfortune. Teammate Charles Leclerc, who had shown genuine pace and was “on a bit of a roll” with two prior podiums, was cruelly taken out of the race in an incident that further highlighted the frustration permeating the team.

Leclerc was running a promising second place following a safety car restart when chaos erupted ahead. Oscar Piastri (McLaren) and Andrea Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) collided at Turn 1, and Antonelli’s car was subsequently speared into the side of Leclerc’s Ferrari, causing race-ending damage.

In a bizarre application of the sport’s increasingly complex racing standards, the stewards ruled Piastri “wholly responsible” for the collision, handing him a 10-second penalty. The ruling hinged on the argument that Piastri did not establish the required “overlap” prior to the corner apex, as defined in the rulebook, forcing him to lock his brakes and make contact with Antonelli, which then led to the secondary contact with Leclerc.

Both Piastri and Leclerc were vocal in their disagreement, arguing that the F1 rulebook is “ridiculous” and anti-overtaking. Piastri insisted he “couldn’t go any further left than I already was” and that the McLaren could not simply disappear. Leclerc backed his rival, stating that while Piastri was not perfectly side-by-side as per the letter of the rule, Antonelli was aware Piastri was on the inside and “cannot really do a corner like nobody is on the inside”. For Leclerc, the blame was “a bit more of a 50/50” split, making the stewards’ ruling feel like a case of punishing a driver for attempting a legitimate move.

Tragically for Ferrari, Leclerc—the innocent third party in the “baffling” incident—was the one who suffered the non-fault retirement.

Looking Beyond the Darkness

The overall picture is one of institutional failure: a team plagued by poor strategy (China DQ), operational fragility (DNF due to an uncharacteristic Hamilton mistake), and a persistent run of bad luck (Leclerc’s non-fault DNF). Ferrari’s season is a painful lesson in how fragile hype can be. The prospect of going winless for the entire season is now a harsh reality.

Despite the overwhelming negativity, Hamilton clings to a sliver of hope, a defiant refusal to surrender the dream he committed to. “I’m trying to keep my head above water. I’m trying to remain positive,” he stated. Acknowledging Leclerc’s qualifying performance, he added, “there is some performance in our car”.

His final words were an act of psychological resilience, attempting to find meaning in the chaos: “At this point I just have to believe that something will come out of all these hardships we’re going through. I’m sure we’re destined for something positive in the future. Maybe we’re getting all of our bad luck out the way this year. We won’t give up.”

This season, however, is now about more than performance; it is a test of character. Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time world champion, is enduring a nightmare on his path to a dream. The question that hangs heavy over Maranello is whether this brutal year will steel their resolve and pave the way for a glorious 2026 debut, or if this season’s disappointment has already poisoned the well, making the dream an impossibility. With the team falling drastically in the standings and its star driver openly describing his existence as a nightmare, the pressure to deliver a radical turnaround next year has never been higher.