Latest news with #tifosi
Malay Mail
19-05-2025
- Automotive
- Malay Mail
‘It felt vintage': Hamilton savours first Ferrari race in front of home tifosi with stunning drive to fourth at Imola
IMOLA (Italy), May 19 — Lewis Hamilton beamed with pleasure after his first experience of racing for Ferrari and the tifosi on home soil at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix yesterday. 'Wow!' said the seven-time champion who left Mercedes to join Ferrari at the end of last year. 'What a day. I am so happy. So happy. 'The experience with the tifosi — wow! 'So, thank you to everyone who came out,' said Hamilton, after finishing a rousing fourth from 12th on the grid. 'It was really special for me to see the sea of red, but it looks like one of the biggest crowds we've had here. It felt vintage! 'It felt like back in the day when I was watching Michael Schumacher race here. A really great experience to see and to experience. 'I definitely didn't expect us to finish fourth. I didn't know where we would be able to come, given we were so far back. 'The car really felt great and the team did a fantastic job with strategy. 'They were faultless. Slowly, we are getting there and me and Riccardo (race engineer, Adami) did a fantastic job with the communication together. 'I was calm and I think he was calm and the team were calm in executing the strategy and the pit stops were awesome. 'Overall, it was mega! I was hoping for some extra laps and maybe we could have fought for a podium.' After a difficult run in adapting to car, team and language in the opening six 'flyaway' races, Hamilton, 40, showed his heart and spirit as he fought for positions and raced to within reach of a possible first podium for Ferrari. But it was a different story for team-mate Charles Leclerc, in his seventh year with the team, as he lamented his car's lack of qualifying pace and other setbacks on his way to sixth. 'You've got to race with heart and put your elbows out,' he said. 'You go to the limit and sometimes a bit over. 'When you start P11, as a driver, I cannot accept the situation we are in.' He was dumbfounded by a stewards' decision to investigate him when he emerged in front after a tense and exciting battle with Alex Albon of Williams. 'With Alex, it was on the limit for sure,' he said. 'As the rules are written, I was on the limit. I don't regret what I have done. I knew when I didn't take a pit stop in the second safety car, it was going to be a difficult race.' The team asked him to give a place back to Albon in the closing laps. Team boss Fred Vasseur said: 'The positive is that the pace was strong from beginning to end. The strategy was good and well executed. I'm a bit frustrated because if we started the race in a better position, we could've done better.' — AFP
BBC News
18-05-2025
- Automotive
- BBC News
'More to come' from Ferrari, says Hamilton
Lewis Hamilton says there is "more to come" from Ferrari after he fought back from 12th place on the grid to finish fourth in the Emilia-Romagna Grand seven-time champion said racing in front of the famous Ferrari fans, the tifosi, had been "a highlight of the year so far" and that there were "lots of positives to take" from the is the first time this year he has finished ahead of his team-mate Charles Leclerc, who was sixth."I did think we would make an improvement this weekend with something I've fixed. And I think there is more to come," Hamilton said. "The set-up was really good, the car felt really mega and the team did a fantastic job on strategy and pit stops."It was a lot of pressure on us with struggling through the year with the car so far, and particularly with our qualifying."I don't remember the last time I had a race like that moving forwards. I'm sure there was one last year but this was different because I'm in the red car. To finally have that connection, that synergy with the car, was a really great feeling."Hamilton used an off-set strategy, starting on the hard tyre, to run long and then was helped by two safety cars. That put him on fresh tyres in seventh place for the final restart, from where he moved up to his final position."Bit by bit strategy started to pan out and the car really came alive when I got on to the medium tyres and a great call at the end," Hamilton 40-year-old Briton said he also savoured the experience of racing in Italy for the first time as a Ferrari driver."It was just really very reminiscent of when I was growing up watching it sitting at home on my couch, having a bacon sandwich watching Michael Schumacher here racing with Ferrari and seeing the connection," he said. "It was quite an incredible experience to think that I'm now here in one of the two Ferraris and having that connection with them. It is such a large passion for me, it's unbelievable."The result - Hamilton's equal best of the year so far in a grand prix - came despite Ferrari's worst qualifying result of the season, with Hamilton and Leclerc starting 12th and added: "We just got to unlock the potential in qualifying. If we had qualified better we would have been in the fight for a podium, which is something we didn't think would be possible." F1 moves on to Monaco next weekend, and Hamilton was thinking positively about the famous race on the streets of the principality."It will still be a question about getting the tyres working in a single lap. If we can figure that out next week then I think we could be in a good position," he Leclerc, who won in Monaco last year, fears the Ferrari's weakness in slow-speed corners could mean "a very difficult weekend"."Monaco is exposing quite a few weaknesses of our car," he added: "I don't think there's any silver bullet to the situation we are in. We just need to work and try to understand from where this problem that we have in qualifying comes from. Which is what is slowing us down at the moment, the Saturdays."Team principal Frederic Vasseur said: "It's clear that we are trying to extract the best from the car on Saturday. The last two weekends what we didn't improve is on the set-up in qualifying."There is a bit of frustration for us. For sure we need to put all our effort on this."
Washington Post
18-05-2025
- Sport
- Washington Post
Lewis Hamilton celebrates a fourth place which highlights Ferrari's tough season in F1
IMOLA, Italy — Lewis Hamilton finished his first Formula 1 race in Italy for Ferrari by dedicating his result to the team's fans. The fact it was fourth place shows how difficult Ferrari's season has become. 'Grazie a tutti (thank you, everyone) for the tifosi, that was for them,' Hamilton said over the team radio, honoring the passionate fans whose shirts made the stands at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix a sea of Ferrari red.
The Guardian
16-05-2025
- Automotive
- The Guardian
Hamilton's great expectations not yet met but Ferrari fans show patience
On the short walk from the railway station in Imola to the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari, the tree-lined streets, scattering dappled spring sunshine, throng with the faithful. They come adorned in the rosso corsa of the Scuderia heading towards their first home race of the season and the long-awaited chance to see the seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton take to the track for the team they feel are their own. The anticipation, building for more than a year, is palpable and the passion that comes with it all too striking – as Hamilton is more than aware. Since Monday the tifosi, as Ferrari fans are known, have stood patiently outside the factory gates at Maranello, less than 50 miles from Imola. There each day to see the drivers arrive in the morning and waiting steadfastly until they leave in the evening, before they follow the team up the road to Imola. When Hamilton announced he was to switch to Ferrari from Mercedes at the start of last season, the tifosi knew there was a full season to go before their man would don the scarlet but even at this race last year his arrival was being celebrated. The most successful driver in the sport's history finally united with the oldest and most successful marque and the dream of finally ending the Scuderia's drivers' championship drought stretching back to 2007. Yet Ferrari are not in the place Hamilton or the team expected for their first foray together on Italian soil. Having finished as runners-up to McLaren last year and closing with a competitive car, this season has opened with disappointment, as the SF-25 struggles for pace and performance. The single swallow that was a win in the sprint race in China for Hamilton was not the harbinger of spring for Ferrari. In Imola Hamilton knew the weight, the history and the hope that is part and parcel of driving for the Scuderia. 'It is pretty incredible the support this team has,' he said. 'There is a lot of high hope and expectation of course but that comes with greatness. When you are a great team, that is what people expect.' Great expectations then but Hamilton is seventh in the drivers' title and 90 points behind the leader, McLaren's Oscar Piastri, with Ferrari fourth in the constructors'. At the last round in Miami he and his teammate Charles Leclerc found themselves in an intense fight with the two Williams cars, there absolutely on merit, and with Leclerc and Hamilton managing only seventh and eighth. The tricky start to the season has been harder on Hamilton who is adapting to a new team, its structure, operations and personnel after 12 years at Mercedes. This is a complex enough task even if the car is quick and compliant, which the Ferrari is not. His frustration has been aired but it is as yet still only that, an immensely competitive driver urging his team on to more. The scrutiny on them all has only ramped up to a greater degree for this home race, as acknowledged by the team principal, Fred Vasseur. 'There is extra pressure but we have to take this as a positive, as a push and to see all the tifosi in the grandstands it's an extra motivation,' he said. 'Lewis's position is that he is taking it as a huge opportunity, this home race in front of the tifosi, with all this enthusiasm.' Certainly here the British driver's arrival has been embraced. Kiarah and her friend Selena, 19-year-olds from Ravenna, were bedecked in Hamilton's No 44 branded Ferrari team gear, with Kiarah, having added a home made set of '44' deeley boppers, waggling enthusiastically with every bob of her head. 'We are so excited to see him,' they said almost in unison. 'We like his mentality, he is a winner. To have him at Ferrari, we are so happy,' said Kiarah. 'He will win for Ferrari, maybe not now but later, he will.' There is then something of a mutual appreciation occurring between driver and perhaps the most ardent fans of them all. A relationship perhaps unique to Ferrari and its place in Italy as Hamilton recognised and was soaking up at Imola. 'You know that Italians are passionate and that there is passion around Ferrari,' he added. 'But it's a lot more than you expect when you are actually in it and it is beautiful.' Hamilton managed fifth fastest in first practice, with the timesheets headed again by the two championship leading McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris but with under a tenth of a second separating the top five. In the afternoon session Piastri was once more on top, two-hundredths clear of Norris but with both drivers enjoying a full two-tenths on Alpine's Pierre Gasly in third, Mercedes' George Russell fourth and Max Verstappen fifth for Red Bull.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Video: Genoa fans set off fireworks after Sampdoria's relegation
The news of Sampdoria's relegation to Serie C sparked wild celebrations among city rivals Genoa, with fans lighting flares and fireworks across the city late into the night. The Blucerchiati ended a dramatic regular season with a 0-0 draw away to Juve Stabia, finishing 18th in the standings and dropping to the third tier for the first time in their history. Shortly after the relegation was confirmed, groups of Rossoblù supporters flooded the streets of Genoa, singing loudly and setting off fireworks and flares to revel in their rivals' downfall. Mentre i tifosi della Sampdoria piangono per una clamorosa retrocessione in Serie C, i tifosi del Genoa festeggiano il declino dei propri rivali di sempre con fumogeni, cori e fuochi d'artificio 🎆#Sampdoria #Genoa #SerieB
