{"id":64988,"date":"2026-01-24T09:21:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T09:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/?p=64988"},"modified":"2026-01-24T09:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T09:21:08","slug":"hamilton-massively-excited-as-ferrari-make-2026-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/hamilton-massively-excited-as-ferrari-make-2026-debut\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamilton &#8220;massively excited&#8221; as Ferrari make 2026 debut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Lewis Hamilton is feeling &#8220;massively excited&#8221; for 2026 as Ferrari debuted its new Formula 1 car on Friday.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The seven-time world champion was first behind the wheel of the all-new SF-26 at the Scuderia&#8217;s Fiorano test track in Italy.<\/p>\n<p>And though mileage restrictions limited Hamilton to just three laps, the Briton, preparing for his second year in red, admits the moment was truly special.<\/p>\n<div class=\"flex flex-col content-rich-text m-auto max-w-full md:max-w-para-md lg:max-w-para-lg\">\n<div class=\"flex flex-col gap-rem-12 md:gap-rem-16 lg:gap-rem-24\">\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201cJust waking up here at Ferrari, it\u2019s very, very special,\u201d he told <a href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/latest\/article\/the-team-feels-refreshed-hamilton-excited-for-new-beginnings-in-2026-after.2rHoqwoSkvD2OGSjDNllG1\"><em>Formula1.com<\/em>. <\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201cObviously, I\u2019ve been here the past week or so, and seeing the car coming together, also just knowing how hard everyone works, and you get to see everyone at their desks every week that I\u2019m here.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"flex flex-col content-rich-text m-auto max-w-full md:max-w-para-md lg:max-w-para-lg\">\n<div class=\"flex flex-col gap-rem-12 md:gap-rem-16 lg:gap-rem-24\">\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201c[Seeing] all the work we\u2019ve been doing on the simulator and just the building blocks that you put in place, to then see a car come together, it is the most exciting part of the year when you see all these pieces come out of different departments, and eventually it all fits together.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201cAnd you\u2019re one of only two that gets to go out and drive it \u2013 it\u2019s pretty remarkable, and I\u2019m so grateful for all the hard work everyone\u2019s put into it.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-media-max-width=\"560\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Our first look at the SF-26 in action! A result from all the hard work from everyone in the factory to Charles and Lewis on track. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/oWdXwKzu3e\">pic.twitter.com\/oWdXwKzu3e<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Scuderia Ferrari HP (@ScuderiaFerrari) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ScuderiaFerrari\/status\/2014690227852296462?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">January 23, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s just so exciting when they fire the car up and you get the new vibration of the car through your body,&#8221; Hamilton added.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Then they open up the door and you end up going down to Turn 1, where you can see the Tifosi.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s something that I will never get used to, and something that I\u2019ll never be able to forget.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;But today\u2019s really about reconnecting with the team, reconnecting with that passion of all the people that follow this team. It\u2019s just a day that reignites you. It really also reminds me of why I love doing what I do and why I love this sport.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Despite a winless 2025, expectations on Ferrari are as high as ever as F1 introduces new power unit and chassis regulations for 2026.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">You made today special \ud83e\udef6 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UxcvdHtDSm\">pic.twitter.com\/UxcvdHtDSm<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Scuderia Ferrari HP (@ScuderiaFerrari) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ScuderiaFerrari\/status\/2014767948271866028?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">January 23, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>And even Hamilton concedes he has a rare buzz going into the new season.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you look at my interviews from all the other years, I would never say that I get excited, but I\u2019m massively excited, and I think that\u2019s okay to say that,\u201d the 41-year-old said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m excited for new beginnings. Obviously, today you don\u2019t get to push it, but it feels cool at Ferrari.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Next week, we\u2019ll start to try and stretch the legs and see what this new generation of car is going to bring to all of this.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201cAnd then it\u2019s kind of knowing what other people have, what cars, what tricks that other people may or may not have, and what concepts and all those sort of things, and I think for us just keeping our heads down and focusing on our job.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">\u201cThe team feels refreshed, and [there\u2019s been] so much work from so many different departments here \u2013 it\u2019s awesome to see, so we\u2019re going to take this energy and just take it one day at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lewis Hamilton is feeling &#8220;massively excited&#8221; for 2026 as Ferrari debuted its new Formula 1 car on Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":64989,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[341,340,295,304],"class_list":{"0":"post-64988","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-ferrari","10":"tag-formula-1","11":"tag-lewis-hamilton"},"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64988"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64990,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64988\/revisions\/64990"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insideracing.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}