The duo of Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton is the new bromance in the F1 paddock. Even before becoming teammates at Ferrari, they have agreed to a potential musical collaboration, which is a shared passion. Moreover, the friendship turned familial when their dogs, Roscoe and Leo, met for the first time and broke the internet with their adorable photos. But where does this leave Carlos Sainz, who has already been betrayed by Ferrari?

Leclerc and Sainz make one of the most formidable driver pairings on the grid. They know each other inside out, and their camaraderie in Ferrari’s promotional videos and interviews is off the charts. But on-track, they are the fiercest of rivals, despite the shows of sportsmanship that you might’ve seen, like Leclerc sacrificing the 2023 Singapore GP win for Sainz, and the Spaniard playing the ultimate team game in Monaco this year to give real-time radio feedback to Ferrari on how the Monegasque could fend the McLarens behind to take his first home victory.

On the Beyond the Grid podcast, that’s how Leclerc described their relationship. “I think we get on very, very well,” he told host Tom Clarkson. “Unfortunately, with the world as it is now, everything is overanalyzed over-criticized, but the reality of things is that we always had a good relationship.”

After showing the good side, the Monegasque revealed how there have been times when “hate” came into the picture. “Yes, there’s been many moments where inside the helmet, I hated him and he hated me because we didn’t view the situation in the same way, but everything was fixed after a discussion between us two and as I said, we get on very well. We share many interests and we had a lot of memorable moments that I’ll remember forever,” he concluded.

Next year, both drivers will begin a new chapter in their lives. Sainz will head to Williams to partner with Alex Albon, who has been the team leader since he joined. Leclerc, as you know, will be joined by a driver who has won more championships than the Monegasque race. How will that partnership work out?

Charles Leclerc trusts himself to hit it off with Lewis Hamilton

In his 17-year F1 career, Lewis Hamilton has experienced one of F1’s worst intra-team rivalries and also one of the best intra-team partnerships. The former was with Fernando Alonso at McLaren in 2008. The latter was with Valtteri Bottas at Mercedes from 2017 to 2021. Contrastingly, Charles Leclerc has only ever experienced great respect and affinity with his teammates.

“I feel like I’ve been lucky in my career, at least in Formula 1, that I’ve always ended up with drivers that are really open to discussions,” the 26-year-old said. “I was also cool to separate what was happening on track and the off-track relationship was important as well. That was always the case with my teammates. On that, I’ve been very happy whether it was Marcus (Ericsson), Seb (Sebastian Vettel), or with Carlos (Sainz) now.”

When further goaded by Clarkson about any bad teammate relationships in the junior categories, Leclerc replied, “I don’t think so. But I think that’s also part of my character. I get on with everybody. I don’t have problems with anybody,” he added, hinting at only good things to come when Hamilton arrives in Maranello next year.

On paper, Hamilton and Leclerc could be the best of teammates. They have also expressed only good things about each other since the Ferrari announcement in February. It is now up to Team Principal Frederic Vasseur to smoothly orchestrate this driver situation into Ferrari’s championship curse.