Abundance of drivers at Ferrari
The 2026 F1 World Championship brought the duo back into the spotlight Hamilton-Ferrariwhich has obviously attracted attention as early as 2025, a season in which, however, the inevitable expectations were extremely disappointed.
In 2025 Charles Leclerc he won the match against the seven-time world champion by a landslide, but for now the score is practically in perfect parity given that Leclerc has one more point because he preceded Hamilton in the Sprint of the Chinese GP. For the rest the two drivers obtained a podium each and even in qualifying the comparison is 1 to 1 considering the two qualifications valid for the starting grid of the GPs.
In the first two races of the season the performance of the ‘little horse’ was also excellent Ollie Bearman. The Haas driver is currently fifth in the Drivers’ standings with 17 points and in China he kept Max Verstappen behind him until the Dutchman from Red Bull was forced to retire. Considering the performance of the Leclerc-Hamilton duo, however, it is difficult to imagine that there could soon be room for Bearman in Ferrari, also because at the driver market level the current performances of McLaren, Red Bull and Aston Martin certainly do not encourage Leclerc to even consider the possibility of leaving a finally competitive Ferrari.
During the podcast ‘Up to Speed‘ Will Buxton and David Coulthard have questioned Bearman’s future, agreeing that it is not a question of ‘if’ Bearman will drive for Ferrari, but ‘when’. “It’s one of the pressures that Ferrari has to manage with Hamilton because I assume that in the end it will eventually be Hamilton who steps aside – said Coulthard – when a star is on the rise like in Bearman’s case you have to ride the wave and not miss the opportunity to put him to the test because it’s totally different to go beyond your possibilities in Haas where there is no pressure compared to being for example half a tenth behind your teammate in Ferrari. It’s that moment when everything changes and when you have to prove that you’re ready to handle the spotlight and the real pressure of being a driver for a top team in F1.”. If Hamilton, however, continues his positive trend, it will be difficult to imagine Lewis taking a step back to make room for Bearman.
