Ferrari left the Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid with another result that exposed more than the final classification alone. Charles Leclerc finished fourth, 29.1 seconds behind race winner Andrea Kimi Antonelli, while Lewis Hamilton retired almost immediately with a braking-system problem. The SF-26 again showed respectable race performance, but qualifying limitations, execution and other underlying weaknesses prevented the Scuderia from turning that potential into a serious challenge at the front.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli claimed his eighth victory after a race heavily influenced by the timing of a Virtual Safety Car, while Lando Norris and Max Verstappen were also central to the strategic battle. Yet the first Madrid Grand Prix also underlined a wider problem: despite an impressive venue close to the Spanish capital, overtaking proved almost impossible and the race offered very little genuine on-track action after its opening stages.
Madrid delivers an impressive venue but little overtaking
Five minutes of racing, then perhaps two strong coffees to stay awake until the finish. Formula 1 chose to create a circuit close to central Madrid and produced a spectacular facility aimed at a relatively exclusive audience: better, it seems, to have 45,000 paying spectators at premium prices, with hospitality designed for tycoon-level guests, than 100,000 passionate and noisy fans who might also create logistical problems.
The problem was that the spectacle itself never really arrived. With overtaking effectively impossible, very little happened in sporting terms from the fourth lap to the chequered flag. Madrid deserves credit for building an impressive facility, but the limitations of such a narrow circuit, with little run-off space and almost no realistic overtaking opportunities, should also have been apparent beforehand.
Instead of focusing only on record numbers and revenues, Formula 1 could perhaps pay greater attention to the substance of the racing product. Today, however, income matters more than ever, while complaints about the quality of the spectacle are increasingly dismissed as nostalgia for an era in which the value of the ticket came primarily from the drivers’ courage and what they produced on track.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli wins after decisive VSC timing
The loudest positive note was Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s eighth victory. The Mercedes driver was one of the central figures throughout the race and ultimately took a result that brings him even closer to the championship.
The more controversial element concerned Lando Norris and the timing of the Virtual Safety Car. Race control did not deliberately choose to penalise the McLaren driver when the VSC was displayed just after Lando Norris had crossed the finish line, but the timing unquestionably benefited Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Max Verstappen, who were six and 12 seconds behind respectively and were able to head directly into the pits for fresh tyres.
Lando Norris then hoped the Virtual Safety Car, triggered by Lance Stroll’s stopped car, would remain active for another lap. Instead, just as the McLaren driver entered the deceleration lane to fit Hard tyres, the VSC ended.
That left Lando Norris with a double setback and ultimately forced him to settle for third place. Attempting to pass Max Verstappen on track would have represented a significant risk, particularly for a driver who has good reason to be wary of the Dutchman’s reactions in close combat.
Kimi Antonelli: “It’s not the way I would have wanted to win”
Did Andrea Kimi Antonelli therefore take his eighth victory purely through luck? Not at all. As so often happens with champions, he simply found himself in the right place at the right time and took full advantage.
“It’s not the way I would have wanted to win,” Andrea Kimi Antonelli admitted with notable honesty.
When the decisive phase arrived, however, the Mercedes driver had the pace to make the difference. His extremely fast closing laps also suggested that even without the strategic injustice suffered by Lando Norris, the McLaren driver might not have had an easy task with such a determined Andrea Kimi Antonelli behind him.
Charles Leclerc keeps Ferrari’s gamble alive
One of the most remarkable aspects of the race was that Andrea Kimi Antonelli spent more than 30 laps following a determined Charles Leclerc, who had yet to make his tyre change and was running extremely well on the Hard compound.
Mercedes told Andrea Kimi Antonelli: “Stay behind him at a safe distance so you don’t damage the tyres and risk overheating the brakes.”
The Italian followed those instructions and, in the meantime, Max Verstappen and Lando Norris caught the pair. It was precisely at that stage that Charles Leclerc finally entered the pits to fit Soft tyres, eventually finishing fourth after being slowed by problems he chose not to explain in detail.
Once Charles Leclerc stopped, Andrea Kimi Antonelli was finally able to accelerate. He was fortunate, certainly, but his own performance should not be overlooked.
Charles Leclerc had effectively kept Ferrari at the head of the strategic race for much of the afternoon, hoping that a Safety Car would materialise at the right moment and give the Scuderia an opportunity to transform its alternative strategy into a much bigger result. The long Hard-tyre stint once again demonstrated why Charles Leclerc remains central to Ferrari’s hopes when the SF-26 can operate in a competitive race window.
Ferrari’s Madrid performance exposes deeper weaknesses
That strategy also highlighted Ferrari’s limitations. In reality, the SF-26 is a very good car, but Madrid once again showed that the team itself still has areas in which it needs greater rigour and consistency if it wants to challenge at the highest level.
The first warning came with Lewis Hamilton’s unusual brake problem almost immediately after the start. Madrid had already been identified as a particularly demanding circuit for braking, with repeated heavy deceleration zones creating a significant technical challenge for the cars. The characteristics of the track and its heavy braking demands made Hamilton’s early problem especially costly.
The seven-time world champion was forced to retire after only a handful of laps, eliminating one Ferrari almost before the race had properly developed. Further updates on Lewis Hamilton and his Ferrari season will therefore be particularly important as the team assesses what caused the failure.
Qualifying again leaves Ferrari with too much to recover
The other major weakness was far more familiar: qualifying. In such a tightly matched field, losing just one tenth can mean falling several places on the grid, and at a circuit where overtaking is so difficult, that effectively compromises the entire Sunday.
Ferrari has repeatedly found itself in this situation. The SF-26 can look far more convincing over a race stint than over a single qualifying lap, but starting behind the leading rivals means the team is forced to rely on alternative strategies, unusual circumstances or Safety Cars to create opportunities.
Charles Leclerc’s final deficit to Andrea Kimi Antonelli — 29.1 seconds — explains the situation more clearly than many technical arguments. Ferrari may have spent much of the race in the virtual lead through strategy, but by the chequered flag the actual performance gap was substantial.
The contrast between the SF-26’s race behaviour and its qualifying limitations remains one of the central themes in Ferrari’s ongoing technical analysis. Madrid provided another example of a car capable of looking competitive over long runs without giving its drivers enough margin on Saturday to start where its Sunday pace might otherwise justify.
Ferrari therefore leaves Spain with more questions than the fourth-place finish alone would suggest. Charles Leclerc extracted what he could from an alternative strategy, while Lewis Hamilton never had the chance to show his race potential because of the brake problem. The car itself again offered flashes of genuine competitiveness, but Madrid also exposed the broader weaknesses that continue to prevent the Scuderia from consistently converting potential into victories.
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