First Lewis Hamilton team radio message as a Ferrari driver emerges and gets F1 fans talking

Lewis Hamilton's first public team radio message as a Ferrari driver has emerged - and it's got F1 fans talking.

Hamilton has been in Maranello, Italy across the week as he prepares for the 2025 season with his new team.

The seven-time world champion has got acquainted with the incredible surroundings of Maranello, including having his first Ferrari photos taken in front of team founder Enzo Ferrari's house.

The Brit has also been at work on the team's simulator, with Gazzetta dello Sport reporting that Ferrari are trying to 'erase' his memory of the Mercedes simulator by 'deliberately' tweaking certain details, such as suspension and engine maps, on their own software.

Ferrari have been holding detailed feedback sessions with Hamilton, while they also have a version of their 2025 chassis ready on the simulator for both Hamilton and team-mate Charles Leclerc to practice with.

On Wednesday, it was time to get down to business on track, with Hamilton completing laps around the team's Fiorano test track while driving a 2023 Ferrari.

He did so in foggy conditions on 'academy' tyres - a step below F1-spec - meaning his first official timed lap perhaps wasn't what fans may have expected compared to those previously completed by Charles Leclerc and Michael Schumacher.

The Scuderia's official social media accounts posted a short video of the test session on Friday - featuring the first publicised radio message between Hamilton and his new race engineer Riccardo Adami.

Adami worked with Carlos Sainz and Sebastian Vettel at Ferrari, with AutoRacer reporting that Hamilton received a glowing recommendation of the Italian by four-time champion Vettel prior to travelling to Maranello.

In the video posted by Ferrari, Adami asks Hamilton over the radio: "Radio check, Lewis?"

The seven-time champion replies: "Wow... whew! Haha."

"Wow, that was amazing," Adami responds.

Reacting to the team radio message on social media, one fan wrote: "LET THE SEASON START NOW."

"The first ever radio check between Lewis Hamilton and Riccardo Adami," another said. "A historic moment."

Another noted: "You can tell he felt like a kid again driving an F1 car for the first time. The fire is there."

Hamilton is permitted to cover 1,000 kilometres in previous Ferrari cars as part of F1's Testing Previous Cars (TPC) regulations.

Current race drivers can cover the distance driving cars from the 2023, 2022 or 2021 seasons across a maximum of four days in the calendar year.

In total, Hamilton completed 89 laps of the 1.862-mile Fiorano circuit, and will take part in a Pirelli tyre test later this month.

He will then take part in pre-season testing in Bahrain between February 26-28, before the season-opening Australian Grand Prix race weekend begins on March 24.

Speaking to Ferrari's official website after his first day on track, the 40-year-old said: "I've been lucky enough to have many firsts in my career, from the first test to the first race, podium, win and championship, so I wasn't sure how many firsts I had, but driving a Scuderia Ferrari HP car for the first time this morning was one of the best feelings of my life."