F1 legend Lewis Hamilton has hit out at the FIA race stewards after being slapped with a penalty during his first Brazilian Grand Prix weekend with Ferrari.
The seven-time champion labelled the stewards ‘a joke’ after he was hit with a five-second time penalty for a collision in the opening stages of Sunday’s race.
On the first lap of the 2025 Brazilian GP, Hamilton recovered from light contact with Carlos Sainz, only to lose his front wing after driving into the back of Franco Colapinto’s Alpine.
The wing then lodged itself under his SF-25, doing further damage to the floor, but his race went from bad to worse when the stewards determined that a five-second time penalty was an appropriate punishment for Hamilton who they deemed had caused the collision with Colapinto.
The 40-year-old then took to team radio to protest the decision, saying: “These guys are a joke! A complete joke! The car moved over on me so I clipped my wing.”
Hamilton’s nightmare first Brazilian GP in red
After 40 laps of the 71-lap grand prix, Hamilton’s Brazilian race in red came to an end, marking the second retirement for Ferrari of the day.
His team-mate Charles Leclerc also DNF’d earlier on Sunday through no fault of his own after being taken out by Kimi Antonelli, who had been hit by Oscar Piastri, with the McLaren star handed a 10-second penalty as a result.
The Scuderia’s failure to pick up any points in Sunday’s race takes them further away from P2 in the constructors’ standings as Mercedes have extended their lead on Ferrari to 32 points – with Red Bull leapfrogging them in the process.
Speaking after the race, Hamilton labelled his season so far at Ferrari a ‘nightmare’, saying: “This is the nightmare I’ve been living in for a while.”
“The flip between the dream of driving for this amazing team and then the nightmare of the results that we’ve had, the ups and downs, it’s challenging.
“Tomorrow I’ll get back up, I’ll keep training, I’ll keep working with the team, I really wanted to get them good points this weekend but I’ll come back as strong as I can in the next race and try to recover.”
