Lewis Hamilton has made a heartfelt admission that his new race engineer, Carlo Santi, has "reignited" his love of being a Formula 1 driver.
The seven-time world champion made the comments after securing his first victory for Ferrari in the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix, with Santi joining him on the top step of the podium.
Hamilton has formed an instant connection with his stand-in race engineer this year, following an abysmal 2025 campaign working with Riccardo Adami.
Several clear cases of miscommunication were evident with Adami last season, whereas a genuine bond has been formed with Santi.
It is a relationship from which Hamilton is thriving, particularly after achieving so much during his 12-year spell at Mercedes working with Peter Bonnington, who is now Kimi Antonelli's race engineer.
Santi has already been referred to as the Italian Bono by Hamilton, who explained the instant compatibility he felt with Ferrari's head of remote engineering.
Asked how it felt being joined by Santi on the podium, Hamilton explained: "Yeah, it was great to have him up there. I think, him kind of substituting this year, jumping in and diving in deep with me.
"We didn’t know each other, we’d never spoken and I didn’t really know much of… I didn’t know anything about him. And we met and I think got on straight away. But it’s great to be able to connect with an engineer other than what I used to have.
"You know, I had it for such a long time and then you kind of lose that feeling because Bono’s now doing it with Kimi. It’s really great to be able to share that experience with him on that stage, and also probably, like, he’s very, very quiet.
"You could tell it’s hard for him to express his emotions. He’s just smiley and, you know, I’m giving him these big hugs and pulling him in, saying thank you.
"I like to think that this has probably reignited the love that he has as being an engineer as he has done for me as a driver."
Originally published by RacingNews365 —
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