Lewis Hamilton qualified only fifth at Zandvoort, but the Ferrari driver concluded Saturday with a renewed sense that he is finally beginning to understand his car around the venue’s sandy dunes.
The Briton had endured a weekend of fluctuating confidence, with Ferrari’s SF-26 refusing to offer the consistency he wanted through the earlier sessions.
Yet when qualifying arrived, Hamilton found a much more cooperative machine underneath him. It did not translate into a front-row challenge, with Mercedes and McLaren ultimately proving quicker, but the improvement in feel was enough to lift his mood ahead of Sunday’s race.
“I was much, much happier with the car. In qualifying, thankfully,” he said.
That matters for Hamilton, who had previoulsy managed to establish a reliable relationship with Ferrari’s latest machinery.
At Zandvoort, the stopwatch still left Ferrari chasing its rivals over one lap, but Hamilton’s comments suggested that his confidence behind the wheel was moving in the right direction.
The difficulty, Hamilton explained, has been maintaining that confidence when the car's behavior can change from one session to the next.
A promising start in FP1 was followed by a less convincing sprint qualifying, forcing him to essentially begin the process again before the main qualifying session.
“But it’s not that helpful when you… It’s like, when it comes to building confidence, it’s like you put in brick by brick; you’re putting it down, building a wall, knocking down that confidence that I had in FP1, didn’t have it through sprint qualifying, and then I just basically started again building,” he explained.
“The car was much better; I’m much happier with it, and I’m excited for tomorrow.”
That renewed optimism could be significant at a circuit where qualifying position is notoriously important.
Ferrari was unable to match the outright pace of Mercedes and McLaren, but the team has already demonstrated that its car can come alive over a race distance.
Charles Leclerc's second place in the Sprint was the clearest evidence, while Hamilton himself believes Ferrari's longer-run performance could allow him to make the most of fifth on the grid.
Saturday’s Sprint also gave Ferrari something encouraging to take into Sunday: genuine race pace. Leclerc was able to fight near the front despite Zandvoort's notoriously limited overtaking opportunities, leaving Hamilton confident that the SF-26 should be more competitive once the qualifying shackles are removed.
“I think our race pace was better today. Mine wasn’t great, but Charles’s particularly was good. I think the car feels much better, and it’s going to be better tomorrow,” concluded the Briton.
“So I think we’ll probably be able to hold on to the guys up ahead, at least.”
Hamilton therefore heads into Sunday in a markedly more positive frame of mind than his qualifying position alone might suggest.
Ferrari still has work to do to close the one-lap gap to Mercedes and McLaren, but Hamilton has at least found something that has been conspicuously absent at times this season: confidence in the car.
And after another weekend of rebuilding it brick by brick, that may be precisely what Ferrari's seven-time world champion needs to turn fifth on the grid into something more rewarding on Sunday.
Read also: Leclerc insists Ferrari ‘have got to work’ on SF-26’s qualifying pace
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