Carlos Sainz has offered some sympathy to Lewis Hamilton as the seven-time world champion’s struggles to adapt to life at Ferrari continue.
“I understand them, because I know how complicated it is,” Sainz said. “Pride? No. You understand why it’s so hard, because I’ve had to suffer through changing teams five times, and it’s something that was hardly talked about before, the adaptation process.
“Before, everybody expected you to be there by the third race. I remember with [Daniel] Ricciardo, when he changed to Renault, and also to McLaren, there was an adaptation process.
“And me too, in every team I’ve changed. And before it was like people didn’t buy it, or saw it as a bit of an excuse. Now that a seven-times champion is changing [teams] and it also costs him, it confirms a bit what I was telling you five or 10 years ago that maybe you didn’t buy it, but now you do buy it.”