Lewis Hamilton bewildered after latest Ferrari mistake

Lewis Hamilton and his new race engineer were involved in another bizarre exchange, as the Formula 1 champion was left bewildered at the Japanese Grand Prix.

Hamilton's Ferrari move has not got off to the best of starts, with the seven-time world champion having only scored one point from his opening two full-length races in red.

The Brit has spoken of the difficulties about settling into a new team, and is trying to build up new relationships having left a settled environment at Mercedes.

One huge change has been his new race engineer Riccardo Adami, with much being made of the pair's testing exchanges at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

Now, at the Japanese GP, Adami appeared to make a confusing mistake when discussing sector times with Hamilton.

Adami suggested that Mercedes' George Russell had put in a second sector time of "27.7 seconds", giving Hamilton's former team-mate a seemingly unreachable advantage.

Hamilton responded, baffled: "27.7? That's 3 seconds faster," before Adami corrected himself: "Sorry 29.7, sorry 29.7, sorry about that."

Hamilton looks forward at the Japanese GP

Hamilton hit out at media at the Chinese GP for the way in which his radio exchanges with Adami were portrayed after Melbourne, claiming that the way Verstappen spoke to his race engineer in the past has been worse.

The seven-time world champion has experienced teething issues in a variety of ways following his move to Ferrari, not just through his team radio communications.

A sprint race victory in China has salvaged his start to the season, and put him ahead of team-mate Charles Leclerc in the drivers' championship, but the pair are sat down in ninth and 10th following disqualifications from the main race in Shanghai.

Hamilton and Ferrari head into the Japanese GP weekend hoping to properly get their season underway with a strong result.

F1 HEADLINES: FIA penalise team as Red Bull inspection takes place at Japanese Grand Prix

Related

Japanese Grand Prix

FIA reveal 21-driver entry list at Japanese Grand Prix

• 3 hours ago

Japanese Grand Prix

Why are Red Bull racing in white?

• 3 hours ago