Lewis Hamilton secured second place in one of the season’s most demanding races on Sunday in Monaco, surviving a pit-lane speeding penalty, tyre struggles and a late Safety Car to deliver Ferrari another podium.
Yet despite the result, the seven-time world champion made it clear that the Scuderia still have significant ground to make up on race-winning Mercedes.
Hamilton's afternoon received an early boost when Max Verstappen stalled on the grid and dropped down the order, promoting the Ferrari driver from third to second before the race had properly begun.
From there, he spent the afternoon chasing an increasingly distant Kimi Antonelli, whose commanding victory underlined Mercedes’ current advantage.
Praise for Antonelli and Mercedes
Rather than dwell on what might have been, Hamilton was quick to salute both his former team and its rising star.
“I have to start by congratulating Kimi and the Mercedes team, my old family,” he said. “They’ve done it again, they’ve created an amazing car and Kimi’s doing an incredible job, just delivering weekend in, weekend out. It’s great to see and I’m really happy for them.
“On our side, I think we’ve been progressing over the past months and can’t quite keep up with them just yet, and it’s probably going to take a lot of work for us to get to their level.
“But to get another second place is such a great feeling, especially in Monaco, under the trickiest conditions. It was the hardest conditions out there, and we’ve had such a great turnout today as well, so I’ll definitely take it.”
While Ferrari has shown clear signs of improvement in recent months, Antonelli’s dominant victory served as a reminder that consistent podiums and race-winning pace are not necessarily the same thing.
A fight from start to finish
Hamilton’s result was far from straightforward. A five-second penalty for pit-lane speeding threatened to derail his race, while tyre degradation made life increasingly difficult during the opening stages.
A timely Safety Car ultimately allowed him to serve the penalty without surrendering position, but the final laps remained a tense balancing act.
Asked what made the Monaco race so challenging, Hamilton pointed directly at Ferrari’s current limitations.
“I think for me it’s really the car,” he said. “The car is good, but we need more downforce ultimately.
“With the tyres, with the different scenarios we had out there, I ran out of tyres quite early in the first stint, and then I was on that long second stint and these tyres aren’t particularly great over a long stint, so holding on to that was going to be tough.
“Once we had to slow down under the Safety Car, you lose all temperature, and you saw with other drivers out there that it was really hard to stay on track. I think just with all different things that have been thrown at us, it was massively challenging but really grateful for the day.
“Happy and grateful to the team, grazie to everyone back at the factory and all the guys here have worked so hard to get this result – they truly deserve this and more, and I’ve just got to keep working harder to see if I can finally take that next step for them.”
Read also: Brembo 'astonished’ by Leclerc’s Monaco brake failure claims
The podium was Hamilton’s eighth in Monaco, drawing him level with Ayrton Senna’s benchmark at the iconic street circuit. More importantly for Ferrari, it continued a run of encouraging results.
But as the Briton’s own verdict made clear, progress and parity are two very different things – and Ferrari are still chasing the latter.
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