Hamilton reveals Barcelona crash disc injury hampered his entire 2025 Ferrari debut season

Lewis Hamilton has revealed that a neck injury sustained during a private pre-season test at Barcelona in January 2025 affected him throughout his entire debut season with Ferrari — a campaign that proved the worst of his 19-year Formula 1 career.

The seven-time world champion was conducting a three-day private test in an SF-23 when he crashed heavily on day two, knocking a disc out of alignment and into a nerve. “I hit the wall very hard last year in testing,” Hamilton said. “Knocked out one of the discs in my neck, which was into the nerve. So, I couldn’t do a lot for like nine weeks. I was having chiropractors every day, physically every day I couldn’t sleep. I had painkillers, I had to get an injection, I did everything I could to try to fix it.”

The injury cast a long shadow over a season in which Hamilton finished sixth in the drivers’ standings, 86 points behind Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc, and endured the first podium-less campaign of his career.

Hamilton made the disclosure ahead of this weekend’s Austrian Grand Prix, speaking in the aftermath of finally claiming his maiden Ferrari victory — on his 31st attempt — at the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona. The win has come as part of a broader resurgence for the 41-year-old, who credits a Ferrari more closely shaped by his own development input and changes to his support personnel.

Despite now sitting just 41 points behind championship leader Kimi Antonelli and nine clear of third-placed George Russell — who has described Hamilton as “a big threat” in the title fight — Hamilton is deliberately keeping his ambitions in check. “I’m just really not thinking that I’m competing for a championship,” he said. “I’m thinking about arriving and I want to win this weekend — that’s my goal.”

He added that the renewed focus has come with personal sacrifices: “I’ve not been having dinners. It’s head back down with the sacrifices you need to make to make sure that you arrive 100% so you can deliver for these people.”