F1 pundit feels that by replacing Carlos Sainz with Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari has lost a consistent benchmark

The Race's F1 pundit has recently come up with a fascinating take regarding Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton. As per Edd Straw, the Ferrari F1 team has lost a benchmark in terms of consistency in 2025 by replacing Sainz with Hamilton.

During the ongoing campaign, the seven-time world champion, Lewis Hamilton, has found it hard to match Charles Leclerc and has also proved quite inconsistent. In the 2025 qualifying head-to-head, Leclerc is currently leading 7-3.

In line with how much Hamilton has struggled in the SF-25, via the The Race F1 podcast, the following was said:

"What Ferrari lost with Hamilton, you know, a lot of gains, and Lewis is a great driver, but it lost a benchmark of consistency, that it knew where both Charles and Carlos were, they both kind of gave different depths of information and different types of feedback on a car." The Race's Edd Straw said.(From 0:01 onwards).

Carlos Sainz, during his Ferrari days, spent four years with the team from 2021 - 2024. During this time, he was incredibly consistent both in qualifying and in the race.

In 2021, Sainz was even able to outperform Leclerc in terms of points at the end of the season. The former managed 164.5 (P5) in comparison to Leclerc's 159 (P7). In the other three campaigns, the competition between the two was again tight.

Carlos Sainz managed a P10 finish in the Canadian GP

While an F1 pundit has asserted that Ferrari has lost a consistent benchmark in 2025 by replacing Carlos Sainz, the latter performed decently in his Williams in the 2025 Canadian Grand Prix.

The Spaniard did not have the best of qualifying, as an impeding incident led to him making an early exit in Q1. As a consequence, he started the 70-lap race at the Gilles-Villeneuve Racing Circuit from the south end of the grid.

The fight in the midfield was incredibly tight, and following all the back-and-forth, Carlos Sainz was able to come away with a point in P10. In line with this, he added the following via his post-race interview:

"If you had told me yesterday after starting 16th that we would get a point, I would be quite proud and happy. But the reality is that I'm not." Sainz said via Autosport.

He further added:

"We have to learn better because it's a few races in a row now that we cannot race on Sunday and it makes our Sunday a bit tricky."

The 2025 Formula 1 season is 10 rounds down, and next up on the race calendar is the Austrian Grand Prix. As things stand, Sainz is currently in 13th place in the drivers' standings with 13 points. His Williams teammate Alex Albon is in seventh with 42.