Ferrari F44: Lewis Hamilton Wants F40 Successor

Multiple Formula One champion Sir Lewis Hamilton may have only just started with Ferrari’s F1 team recently, but he’s already got some big plans for the Prancing Horse.

Speaking to motorsport.com at the first F1 round in Australia, Hamilton said he had ambitions of designing a Ferrari F40 successor – but with a nod to his racing number, 44.

“One of the things I really want to do is I want to design a Ferrari. I want to do an F44,” Hamilton said.

“Baseline of an F40, with the actual stick shift. That's what I'm gonna work on for the next few years.”

While nothing has been announced by Ferrari, it sounds as if Hamilton has already received the backing of company management in Italy to work on the project.

His comments about a “baseline of an F40” suggest the vehicle could be more along the lines of a modern interpretation of an F40, rather than another vehicle to slot into a lineage that includes the F50, Enzo, La Ferrari, and the most recent hypercar, the F80.

Curiously, in November 2024, UK magazine Top Gear cited “highly reliable sources” who claimed Ferrari had begun work on a “modernised tribute” of the F40, to be built in limited numbers.

Earlier that same year, Hamilton had announced 2024 would be his last with the Mercedes-AMG F1 team, choosing to move to Scuderia Ferrari in 2025.

While only speculation at this point, it’s not unreasonable to assume Ferrari may have promised the opportunity to work on his own ‘special project’ as a deal sweetener.

Ferrari borrowed the latest technology from F1 when building the F40 in the late 1980s, utilising a carbon-fibre and kevlar composite body over a tubular steel spaceframe chassis.

However, the subsequent Ferrari F50 is said to have been more like an F1 car, with the car’s 4.7-litre V12 powerplant derived from the F1 car’s 3.5-litre V12.

These digital illustrations provide an idea of what a modern F44 could look like, created by artist Samir Sadikhov from German studio GDMW Design.