Martin Brundle 'alarmed' as Lewis Hamilton made Ferrari debut in Melbourne

Lewis Hamilton began his first competitive session as a Ferrari Formula 1 driver with the message “the new era begins” on his steering wheel. He ended it complaining that he was “struggling to turn” his SF-25.

And leaving the Ferrari garage with his helmet still on was not a “good sign”, says Martin Brundle.

Lewis Hamilton’s actions ‘alarmed’ Martin Brundle

Hamilton was all smiles as he entered the Ferrari garage in the Albert Park pit lane on Friday, the Briton set to begin a new era as his steering wheel proclaimed.

“THE NEW ERA BEGINS.”

That was the message that was boldly written across his steering wheel as he drove out of the garage and slotted in ahead of his team-mate Charles Leclerc for his first lap of the weekend. Despite a small lock-up, he went P7 in the early running.

Analysis: Lewis Hamilton’s mega-millions move to Ferrari

👉10 biggest sports deals in history: Where does Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari salary rank?

👉Lewis Hamilton net worth: Where does he rank against football icons Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo?

While he flirted with a top-three position on the medium tyres, he was unable to maintain it as others, including his team-mate Charles Leclerc, improved before the swap to soft tyres didn’t go to plan.

Hamilton went eighth on his flying lap and wasn’t able to improve on the next as he reported that he was “struggling to turn the car”. He fell to 12th at the chequered flag.

His time was 0.819s slower than Lando Norris’ P1 time and six-tenths down on his team-mate Leclerc’s best with the Monegasque driver P3.

But what happened after the session was the worry for former F1 driver and Sky Sports pundit Martin Brundle.

“What alarmed me a little bit was that Lewis came out the back of the garage wearing his crash helmet,” he said. “Which I never think is a good sign, having done that myself as well.

“I think he’ll be a little bit frustrated with that first session. He looked pretty good early on, but it depends if he had some issues, we’ll find out later.”

However, Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur isn’t at all concerned.

“It’s not to be at the limit on one session,” he said. “It’s not a matter of speed. The target is for him to know everybody in the team, to discover the software, the process, the system.

“I think that we have something very similar to Mercedes, but at the end of the day, perhaps not with the same name or the same way to use them and be just a learning process.

“But we did one or two test day with the TPC one month or two months ago. It was a good way to approach it, but nothing compared to a race weekend.

“He’s on this process. You can’t draw a conclusion of the first session.

“I have absolutely no doubt that he will be able to perform and to perform soon. And last year, I think that Carlos was P8 or P9 in practice and he won the race.”

Read next: Australian GP: Big crash for Bearman as Norris sets the pace and Carlos shines in FP1

Click here to read article