Why Lewis Wins 2025 WDC
- Tarasekhar Padhy
- Jan 21
- 6 min read
Recently, Lewis visited Maranello for the very first time, dressed up as an Italian mobster.
As a deeply closeted Lewis Hamilton fan, I have to relay my honest predictions about the upcoming Formula 1 season.
First, I will share why the championship contenders will fail to beat Lewis. Then, we will look at Lawrence Baretto’s 2025 predictions, which confirm Lewis' 8th WDC, his first one for Ferrari.
There are three championship contenders: Charles, Lando, and Oscar.
You may be wondering why Max and George aren’t there.
Red Bull and Mercedes Will Be Slow in 2025
After Adrian Newey’s departure, the Milton Keynes outfit has struggled to dominate the competition. The visible drop in Max’s pace through the 2024 season is proof of that. Yes, Max had victories after that, namely Brazil and Qatar, but there are reasons for that.
The Sao Paolo GP occurred in the torrential rain. You can give little credit to the RB20 because Checo, Max’s teammate, finished outside the points whereas the Dutch driver won with the fastest lap and pulled a 20-second margin to P2 despite starting from P17.
In the Qatar GP, Max qualified on the front row after George screwed him over by pretending to be a damsel in distress in front of the stewards. This additional rage pushed Verstappen to secure the lead into the first turn.
The only other driver who could’ve challenged him in the Lusail International Circuit was Lando Norris, who received a 10-second stop-and-go penalty because he failed to lift during double-waved yellows.
In about two-thirds of the season, Max Verstappen continued to outperform the car and remain consistent, something the championship challenger Lando Norris failed to. This extraordinary ability to extract everything out of the machine earned the Dutchman his much-deserved fourth-world title.
People also forget that they had a great start in the 2024 season. Verstappen won seven of the first ten races when the car was still relatively dominant compared to the rest of the field.
Considering the upcoming regulations change in 2026, I don’t think Red Bull will invest that much in refining a dying car. And honestly, it happens toward the end of each era of F1 regulations.
We saw it with Mercedes in the 2021 season, and Red Bull will go through it in the upcoming one.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that Verstappen will go winless through 2025. He may win a few Grand Prix here and there. However, the car won’t be competitive throughout the season to mount a solid challenge to the title.
Speaking of the Brackley-based outfit, these guys are an honorable mention. Just like the 2024 season, there will be bursts of performance in certain tracks. But it won’t matter. Again, the fact that 2025 is the last season for the current generation of cars almost ensures that the Mercedes will be occasionally competitive.
Why Hamilton Beats the Three Challengers
1. Charles Leclerc
The 2022 F1 season.
In Imola, he did a classic spin, dropping from a potential P2 to P6.
In France, he crashed out when leading the race.
These two crucial mistakes cost him a lot of points, allowing Max Verstappen to continually inch closer to his second world championship.
Apart from unforced driving errors, he also gets screwed over by the classic Ferrari strategies.
In the same 2022 F1 season, various decisions from the Ferrari pit wall cost Charles victories, at least in the Hungarian and British GP. He was left on the track with ill-suited and old tires respectively.
The strategic errors continued in 2024 as well. I distinctly remember the Silverstone GP where he put on inters before the track was wet enough for those tires and was losing about 30 seconds per lap to the slowest car on the grid.
Look, i am perfectly aware that Leclerc will have the same machine as Hamilton and the Monagasque is no joke. Leo’s dad is great at qualifying, leading into the first turn, managing tires, and wheel-to-wheel battles.
However, you need to understand that Leclerc is the embodiment of the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. That’s what makes Formula 1 so beautiful. Elations and gut-wrenching moments.
That’s also how dopamine works.
The 2024 season was filled with such moments. While Charles won in Monaco and Monza he suffered from various predicaments in different tracks that potentially cost him a few other victories.
As a fan of the sport, this is heartbreaking but you have to realize that life brings both happiness and sorrow. The juxtaposition makes the celebrations great.
Charles Leclerc, while a great driver, adds a tinge of melancholy to the sport.
It is quite possible that he will start strong and will perform well in multiple venues. But the blues will be there. A series of mistakes from himself and the Ferrari pit wall will put him out of contention in the 2025 season.
2. Oscar Piastri
The Australian driver has demonstrated jaw-dropping racecraft in the 2024 season. The compilation of the top 20 overtakes features Oscar five times! At the same time, he has some weaknesses.
The biggest one is his qualifying performance. He had zero pole positions in the past season. It is a huge thing considering the McLaren was the faster car for the majority of the year.
When you are going against Lewis Hamilton, you need to beat him everywhere, including the starting grid position.
Moreover, he has some improvement to do. If you recall the Sao Paolo GP 2024, he was terrible. We were all fixated on the Alpines getting on the podium and Max smoking the field while laughing at Lando’s mistakes, and Piastri’s abysmal performance was ignored.
Not only he was uncompetitive in a car that was faster, proven by the lack of defense when Verstappen was tearing through the field, but he also messed up and hit Liam Lawson, earning a 10-second penalty.
You can’t beat Lewis if you make such mistakes during a title fight. I am aware that Hamilton himself had a bad race at Interlagos, but that wasn’t really a true representation of his ability.
3. Lando Norris
Do we even need to dunk more on this lad?
The guy can’t keep the lead in the first lap even if his life depended on it. He cracks under pressure, fails to make the most out of terrible situations, and gets easily bullied.
All things considered, Lando’s biggest impediment is his soy mentality. Dude is too busy giving his rivals hugs, smiles, and waves that he forgets to see them as, well, rivals. He doesn’t seem to understand that friendships die at the highest echelons of competition, like F1.
If anyone, such as Lawrence Barretto, believes this guy is gonna beat Don Hamiltone need to share the contact details of their dealer.
Keep in mind that my predictions are based on the belief that Ferrari will be the fastest car in 2025. And Barretto agrees.
“Ferrari Wins WCC” — Lawrence
In an article, the correspondent shares his predictions for the upcoming season.
He states that the Maranello outfit will win the constructor’s title but Norris will capture the WDC. [1]
While the assumption that Ferrari will arrive with the fastest car seems valid, the forecast that Lando will beat both Hamilton and Leclerc is absurd.
The third-generation Christian convert needs to realize that Norris ain’t beating Oscar, let alone Don Hamiltone. That’s another prediction from me, by the way.
Lewis is better everywhere, compared to Lando. In the 2021 season, the Red Bull did have a pace advantage at the beginning of the season. And Hamilton did give Max a run for his money, and that’s putting it lightly.
I doubt Norris can pull anything like that ever. Sad, but true.
Even if Red Bull shows up with a decent enough car, I doubt Max can beat Lewis unless they have a clear pace advantage. Just remember that Hamilton was winning the 2021 championship until he was robbed.
This is something Verstappen fans deny, which is funny among other things. Pulling 12-second gaps to Max twice while battling Checo on a track like the Yas Marina Circuit is no joke.
Looking Forward: Emotional Moments For the Tifosi
The team in red will win their first-ever combined WDC since 2007 and first-ever WCC since 2008.
It’s really wild to see that the guy who beat Ferrari for all those years in succession will win championships for them.
What a time to be alive. What a time to be an F1 fan.
To clarify things, I am not a Hamilton fan.
Until next time,
Tara
