Ferrari is set to introduce upgrades to its SF-25 car at next weekend’s Austrian Grand Prix, team boss Fred Vasseur confirmed, signaling a shift in the car’s development after a period of incremental changes. These planned improvements aim to address performance challenges and enhance competitiveness as the Scuderia races at the Red Bull Ring.

Although Vasseur acknowledged the updates will arrive soon, he tempered expectations about the scale of their effect, emphasizing that fine execution and setup adjustments will play a crucial role in maximizing gains from the changes rather than the modifications themselves generating large leaps in speed.

Details of Ferrari’s Upgrade Focus and Expected Impact

Upgrades are expected to target the rear pullrod suspension, which Ferrari switched to during the winter, with the goal of improving the SF-25’s stability and allowing the car to operate at a more performance-optimized ride height window. This adjustment follows challenges Ferrari faced related to running the car too low, which notably contributed to Lewis Hamilton’s Chinese Grand Prix disqualification due to excessive plank wear.

Fred Vasseur underlined this focus on refinement:

“We will have an upgrade soon, before the UK. And, perhaps, another one a bit later,”

he said after the Canadian Grand Prix. He further explained,

“Now, we are at the end of the life of these regulations, and we all know that, when we are bringing something on track, we are more speaking about hundredths than tenths.”

Highlighting the importance of how the upgrades are incorporated, Vasseur added,

“If you don’t do a good usage of the car because the set-up is a bit different, you can lose tenths.”

He recalled Ferrari’s past experiences, noting that initial introduction of upgrades can take one or two races for the team to adapt fully:

“A couple of times, on our side at least – and we are not the only one – when we brought upgrades in the past, we needed one or two races to adapt the car, to adapt the set-up to the new version.”

Vasseur reiterated the emphasis on the team’s operational excellence, stating,

“Honestly, I think that, and I want to put the focus on the team, there is much more [to come from] the execution than the pure potential of the car. But we will bring something.”

Reflecting on what can be expected at the Austrian Grand Prix, he referenced Ferrari’s strong performance in Monaco and the need for consistent execution:

“We have to target doing this. But if we want to achieve, if we want to start from the first rows, and to have a clean weekend like Monaco, we need to do a very smooth weekend in terms of execution. It’s where we failed massively in Canada.”

Lewis Hamilton Calls for Ferrari SF-25 Upgrades to Enhance Competitiveness

After qualifying fifth and finishing sixth in Canada, Lewis Hamilton described how various issues with the SF-25 affected the car’s performance throughout race weekends. He pointed out that certain components, such as the floor or rear wing, occasionally failed to produce the required downforce, leading to inconsistent performance across practice sessions and qualifying.

Hamilton noted,

“But we had a good, solid day yesterday, and then today we made progress. We didn’t change a huge amount, and the car felt solid. We moved forward, which I think is a first for this season. So I’m grateful to get through to Q3.”

Despite these improvements, he emphasized the necessity for continued upgrades to challenge the leading teams.

He explained the ongoing process within the team:

“It’s just incremental steps. We’ve not had any upgrades or anything like that; it’s been the same car for quite some time now. And, with the same package each weekend, I’m just challenging the guys.”

Hamilton also shared his approach to collaborating with engineers, saying,

“I’m constantly battling the engineers, asking them questions. Because they set things up and are like ‘This is how we always do it’ and I’m like ‘what about this?’.”

Hamilton stressed the importance of progress through upgrades, stating,

“So we work on trying things, and bit by bit, we are making progress. We’re improving our qualifying from Monaco onwards, which is positive. Ultimately, we need upgrades. We need an upgrade to be able to fight the guys up front.”

Balancing Current Car Development Amid Focus on 2026 Regulations

The Formula 1 teams face the dual challenge of developing their current cars for this season while preparing for the completely new regulations to be introduced in 2026. Hamilton described this as a key priority and shared his perspective on how this affects in-season upgrades.

He reflected on his experience with different teams and seasons:

“It’s my first half of the year in a new team. It’s interesting to see how different teams work and operate,”

he said.

“There’ve been times in my career where you’ve had a whole bunch of upgrades very, very early on in the season, and you plow ahead very early, then you stop and taper off, and then sometimes it’s been slower.”

Hamilton also commented on the difficulty of finding performance gains with the current generation of cars and the strategic focus on future vehicles:

“It’s also, in the last year of this generation of cars, harder to find performance, and you could, at least, focus on the next year.”

Looking ahead, he underlined his ambitions:

“The fact is, with this car, we hopefully can still fight for a second in the Constructors’, which would be great, but I want a car that can win next year, so that’s priority.”