Lewis Hamilton wants Ferrari to draw a line before the next crash does it for them.
The seven-time champion called on his bosses to introduce “rules of engagement” between its two drivers—he and Charles Leclerc—after the two were involved in a messy first-lap battle that caused the latter to crash and cost the former further ground in the title fight at the Italian Grand Prix. Hamilton finished sixth. Leclerc didn’t finish at all as he crashed out at Parabolica on lap 2, triggering a 30-minute red flag.
Friction in Ferrari Starts Early
The trouble started early. Hamilton and Leclerc lined up third and fourth on the grid, side by side, and went wheel-to-wheel in the first chicane. Hamilton tried to pass on the inside at Turn 1, which left him exposed on the outside at Turn 2, where he was pushed wide and lost five positions in the process. He got on the radio immediately—”Charles pushed me off”—and was running ninth by the time Leclerc’s race ended two corners into lap 2.
Leclerc didn’t dodge responsibility afterward. “Here it’s true, though, that we went too far, I think, with Lewis in Turn 1,” he said. “Then in Turn 2 I tried to do the tightest corner possible, but that was just not enough, and doing it here is not good.” Hamilton saw it differently, arguing his position at the apex earned him the space. “I was ahead in Turn 2, by the apex, I was ahead,” he said. “There was no ‘we’ in it.”
Team principal Fred Vasseur wouldn’t wade into it publicly. “I prefer to discuss with them first than with you first,” he said.
Lewis Hamilton Wants Preventive Systems in Place
For Lewis Hamilton, the incident wasn’t really about one corner—it was about the absence of any system to prevent it. “It comes down to rules of engagement,” he said. “When I was at Mercedes, we had a written rule of engagement. We never really had it too bad, maybe between me and Nico a couple of times, but more often than not it was good. Here there are no rules, and I think that’s something that we need to try and address.”
The championship math only sharpened the frustration. Kimi Antonelli won at Monza to push Hamilton’s deficit to 76 points, with Leclerc now 112 points off the lead. Hamilton doesn’t believe better teamwork alone fixes that gap anymore. “From today, we’ve just lost so much ground to them on points,” he said. “It’s far too late for those decisions to come. It’s many, many weeks too late.”
Pressure Solely on Vasseur
Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time world champion, placed the responsibility for change squarely on Vasseur. “It starts with Fred,” Hamilton said. “Ultimately, it comes from the top and it trickles down as decisions.” He said the team would address it “offline” after the next race.
Leclerc, meanwhile, has his own recovery to manage. He passed trackside medical checks after the crash but admitted his right eye briefly lost clarity on impact. “The neck was OK, it was just the vision a little bit at first,” he said, adding he expects further checks before Madrid. “Better be safe than sorry.”
Some rules of engagement, as Lewis Hamilton put it, could keep both drivers safe in the future.
