3 reasons why the Lewis Hamilton-Ferrari combination lost to Aston Martin in a bid for Adrian Newey's services

If reports are to be believed and it does appear that they're more or less accurate, then Adrian Newey has given up on the idea of partnering with Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton and will instead go to Aston Martin. The ace engineer's future has been one call that has kept everyone interested.

For a long time, it was almost assumed that the reason behind Adrian Newey leaving Red Bull was because he was going for one last push with Ferrari. With Lewis Hamilton joining the Italian team, it did appear that the union was as close as it could ever have been.

However, with the decision of Adrian Newey to join Aston Martin all but imminent, looking back, it might be safe to say that the Lewis Hamilton-Ferrari combination was never going to be enough to lure the ace engineer to Maranello. Here's why!

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Why Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari were snubbed by Adrian Newey

#1 The shift of base from England to Italy

So many people forget one very basic thing, Adrian Newey is 65 years old now and this is not the age for someone to explicitly shift bases from one place to another. Moving to Ferrari would have meant Newey would have had to leave Britain for Italy.

That's not only a change in country, it's a change in culture, a change in language, and a change in how his day is spent. It might be easy or possible for someone younger, but at Newey's age, this becomes very hard, and looking back, this was one of the biggest red flags when it came to the designer joining Ferrari.

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#2 Ferrari's politics can be a turn-off

The second point has to be the fact that while teaming up with Lewis Hamilton is a great opportunity and being a Ferrari man is brilliant, that environment is still too political. Ideally, a team should be left to the team principal to manage and sort things out.

Ferrari just doesn't work like that and one of the biggest alarms was the fact that Lewis Hamilton joining the Italian team was not because he had the negotiations with Fred Vasseur. The negotiations were with John Elkann.

That's someone who is not part of the day-to-day handling of the team exercising his authority, and when something like that happens, it's never a good thing.

One thing that probably triggered Adrian Newey's departure from Red Bull was the fact that the team has started to become a hotbed for politics, which has been a complete no-no for Adrian throughout his career. Unfortunately, even though Ferrari will have Lewis Hamilton soon, the politics is still an intrinsic part of that team.

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#3 The Aston Martin project might be the most ambitious on the F1 grid

Finally, and possibly the most important part that many might have missed, is that with Aston Martin, Adrian Newey has the possibility of taking another team with not much F1 legacy. If Newey wins the title at the Italian team, the accolades would have a portion of it go to Ferrari, then there would be a chunk going to Lewis Hamilton or Charles Leclerc, and then finally, the third part goes to Adrian Newey.

Aston Martin is a project that means business. It wants to win, and to do that, it is willing to ruthlessly go after talent. If Newey takes that squad to the top, then the already brilliant legacy of the ace engineer takes another bump and becomes even more impressive.

To add to this, one thing that cannot be ignored is the hunger for success of Lawrence Stroll. He's someone who has succeeded in everything he's ever done, and he wants to win in F1 as well. That hunger and prestige is something that would have resonated with Newey as he seemingly finally made the call to join the Silverstone-based squad.