Lewis Hamilton wants to design a modern day Ferrari F40 with manual gearbox
F for 'fantasy', or will Ferrari build Hamilton's dream?
Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton made headlines with his move from Mercedes to Ferrari for the 2025 F1 season, and he’s not wasting his opportunity to make his mark with the exalted prancing horse brand: the British seven-times world champion wants to create a new supercar in the spirit of the legendary Ferrari F40.
Speaking at the Australian Grand Prix earlier this month, Hamilton said he’d like to base the car, which he suggested calling the F44, in a nod to his racing number, on the “baseline” of the F40, and include a manual gearbox.
”One of the things I really want to do is I want to design a Ferrari,” he told Motorsport.com. “I want to do an F44. Baseline of an F40, with the actual stick shift. That’s what I’m gonna work on for the next few years.”
Enzo Ferrari’s last road car
Ferrari may be hoping Hamilton concentrates more on his track performance than a new performance road car, as despite a Sprint race win in China the Briton is facing a climb up from his current position of ninth in the championship after two races — not helped by both Ferrari F1 cars being disqualified from the Chinese GP, it has to be said.
But there’s no doubt Ferrari aficionados will be excited by the prospect of a Hamilton-penned car based on the legendary F40.
Launched to celebrate Ferrari’s 40th anniversary in 1987, the F40 was the last road car personally approved by Ferrari founder Enzo Ferrari before his death in 1988.
Lightweight and powered by a 2.9-litre, twin-turbocharged V8 petrol engine, it was described by renowned designer Gordon Murray as a “big go-kart with a plastic body.”
However, the F40 used Kevlar and carbon-fibre technology taken from F1, and though it lacked practicality, rear visibility and refinement, its visceral driving experience meant it quickly became the stuff of legend. Today, it is one of the most desirable Ferraris ever made.
It has always been considered a tricky car to drive on the limit, though, largely thanks to its old-school turbochargers and, more accurately, their lag. It’s something that has caught out a number of drivers, including the poor soul behind the wheel in January of this F40 — owned by Hamilton’s F1 rival Lando Norris.
Grand designs
There’s no word as yet on how Hamilton’s F44 adaptation might look — there’s no indication Ferrari is even going to build such a thing — but we can speculate what it might offer.
Naturally, Hamilton has expressed his desire to retain a manual gearbox, just like the original F40, but Ferrari hasn’t built a three-pedal manual car in years and may not be especially enthralled by the idea.
Nevertheless, a manual gearbox would likely sit well with customers, and we can imagine a turbocharged engine would likely feature, too. Like the original F40, the F44 would almost certainly play on the F1 links with technology and features based on race cars. An overly complicated, control-festooned steering wheel is almost certain to feature.
And who is prepared to take bets on a limited run of just 44 cars (each costing a fortune, naturally)?
More pressing concerns
In the more immediate future, Hamilton and his Ferrari team-mate, Charles Leclerc, will be hoping they can bounce back from their disqualifications at the Chinese Grand Prix.
Neither driver was necessarily at fault, which saw Hamilton’s sixth-place finish wiped out because the board under the car had worn too greatly during the race, suggesting the car was hugging the ground too closely. Monegasque driver Leclerc’s fifth-place finish was declared invalid because his car was too light when it was weighed after the race.
Even without the disqualifications, Ferrari would have deemed the start to the season a little underwhelming, with Hamilton labouring to a 10th-place finish in Australia before his significant improvement in form the following weekend in Shanghai. Ferrari currently sits fifth in the teams championship, equal on points with Williams and 71 points behind frontrunners McLaren.
The F1 circus rolls into Suzuka, Japan, on April 4, and it sounds as though Hamilton may well have his sketch book out during the long flight to the Far East.
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