Ferrari’s team principal did not soften the response. Asked about Lewis Hamilton’s post-Monza call for a formal framework governing how he and Charles Leclerc race one another, Fred Vasseur pushed the premise off the table.

“To say there are no ‘rules of engagement’ does not reflect reality,” Vasseur said, in comments published on 11 September.

“You cannot expect every possible scenario you might encounter on track to be written into the contracts, because inevitably everything would become a matter of interpretation.”

Hamilton had gone public five days earlier at the Italian Grand Prix. After a first-lap collision with Leclerc at Monza sent him onto the gravel, and Leclerc later crashed out at the Parabolica, Hamilton drew a pointed comparison with his old team.

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“When I was at Mercedes, we had a written rule of engagement. So, we never really had too bad,” Hamilton said on 6 September. “Here there are no rules. And I think that’s something that needs to try and fix up.”

Vasseur’s Mercedes counterpunch

Vasseur reached for the same team to make the opposite point. He argued Ferrari were being judged by a standard nobody else in the paddock faced.

“Charles, after the discussion, said: ‘I was too aggressive.’ And for me, that’s fine,” Vasseur said.

“When Kimi was fighting with Russell he ended up in the gravel, just as Lewis did at the start. But in our case, we moved very quickly from an incident on track to talking about a crisis in the way the drivers are being managed.”

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He also disclosed a private exchange with Hamilton that reframed the driver’s public complaints.

“Lewis told me: ‘Fred, 80% of my message was positive and they took the 20% that was negative,'” Vasseur said.

“But we all know how it works. If you say the team is doing a good job and then add a ‘but’, that is the part that will become the headline.”

Hamilton left waiting in Madrid

By the time Hamilton spoke in Madrid on the Thursday before the Spanish Grand Prix, no framework had been agreed. The seven-time champion said the pair had held what he called a “positive” conversation with Vasseur on the Monday after Monza, but conceded nothing concrete had followed.

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“We can’t change things in two days,” Hamilton said.

The car failed him too

Forty-eight hours after Vasseur’s public rebuke landed, the Ferrari failed him. Starting fourth at the Spanish Grand Prix, held in Madrid for the first time, and running as high as third, he reported no brakes and retired on lap seven.

“The pedal just went fully to the end, so I was lucky to make it round,” Hamilton told reporters.

He described an intermittent fault that first appeared at Turn 5 on the opening lap, briefly cleared, then came back with enough severity that Ferrari called him in.

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Ferrari’s team principal said trackside adjustments were tried and abandoned.

“Staying on track made no sense in a crazy race. We didn’t want to take any risk,” Vasseur said.

The retirement ended Hamilton’s streak as the only driver to complete every racing lap of the 2026 season. He had gone into Madrid 76 points behind championship leader Andrea Kimi Antonelli. Ferrari have said they will investigate the brake failure before the next round.

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