Charles Leclerc’s front-row start in Baku came with a heavy deficit to Mercedes, but the eight-tenth gap to George Russell tells a more complicated story than a simple lack of Ferrari performance. The SF-26 is increasingly being forced to search for straight-line speed, tyre temperature and platform stability at the same time, leaving Ferrari with a more restrictive setup window even though the car does not appear to have suddenly lost its underlying pace.
Frédéric Vasseur’s comments help explain the wider picture. Ferrari’s power-unit deficit is beginning to influence aerodynamic choices as well, creating a chain of compromises that becomes progressively more difficult to manage. Baku provided perhaps the clearest example yet of the problem, with the SF-26’s limitations particularly exposed around the Azerbaijan street circuit.
What changed for Ferrari after Budapest?
The obvious question after watching Ferrari over recent weeks is what happened to the SF-26 seen before the summer break. In Budapest, Ferrari had an extremely competitive car, capable of running ahead of Mercedes over a single lap and showing pace from practice that appeared to confirm the progress made over the preceding races.
Something changed afterwards. Not necessarily on the stopwatch, at least not immediately, but more noticeably in the behaviour of the car.
The numbers make a simple explanation difficult. Across the four races between Barcelona and Spa, the average deficit of the fastest Ferrari to the fastest Mercedes was around four hundredths of a second per kilometre. After Budapest, the figures remained broadly within the same range: 0.054s/km at Zandvoort, 0.027s/km at Monza and 0.033s/km in Madrid.
There was therefore no immediate collapse and no sudden loss of three or four tenths that would allow one specific point in the season to be identified as the moment the SF-26 stopped working. Ferrari still has speed. The difference is that the car increasingly appears to require more precise conditions in order to express that performance.
Baku exposes the SF-26’s narrower operating window
At Baku, the limitation became much more visible. George Russell took pole with a 1:42.526, while Charles Leclerc stopped the clock at 1:43.363. The difference was 0.837 seconds, equivalent to around 0.139 seconds per kilometre and one of Ferrari’s largest deficits of the season.
Yet Charles Leclerc still qualified second. The result was better than Ferrari’s overall competitiveness across the weekend would have suggested, helped by an excellent final attempt, Andrea Kimi Antonelli already being out of contention following the Q1 accident and Red Bull failing to convert the promise it had shown in FP3.
The result also has to be understood through the effect of the slipstream. Lewis Hamilton explained that Ferrari changed its Q3 release plan, effectively leaving Lewis Hamilton without a useful car ahead, while Charles Leclerc ended up with Lewis Hamilton in an ideal position in front of him.
Charles Leclerc made excellent use of the opportunity. Lewis Hamilton had estimated during FP3 that a significant tow had been worth roughly six tenths of a second. At the decisive point in qualifying, that advantage ended up benefiting car number 16.
The different aerodynamic directions taken by the two Ferrari drivers are another important part of the picture. Charles Leclerc used the lower-drag configuration, while Lewis Hamilton selected the higher-downforce version, a choice explored in more detail in the analysis of how Lewis Hamilton moved away from Ferrari’s low-drag Baku solution while Charles Leclerc retained it.
The telemetry reflected those choices reasonably clearly. Lewis Hamilton was more effective through several of the more technical sections, while Charles Leclerc found speed more easily along the straights. The tow dramatically amplified the difference between the two cars, but it did not create that separation on its own.
Why Lewis Hamilton chose more downforce
Lewis Hamilton’s setup choice can also be understood through Ferrari’s tyre difficulties. More downforce provides greater support through the corners and transfers more energy into the tyres, exactly one of the areas that had troubled Lewis Hamilton from practice onwards.
The situation did not improve significantly in the race. Lewis Hamilton’s first set of tyres only began to work properly towards the end of the stint, while the following set never genuinely entered its operating window. Lewis Hamilton continued trying to build tyre temperature, but the car kept sliding and the expected response never arrived.
That trade-off was central to Ferrari’s weekend, with the higher-drag SF-26 configuration giving Lewis Hamilton more stability but carrying its own performance cost.
Frédéric Vasseur explains Ferrari’s negative spiral
This is where Frédéric Vasseur’s comments become particularly significant. The Ferrari team principal acknowledged that, under certain conditions, the team runs less aerodynamic load than would be optimal for lap time simply to defend itself on the straights.
It creates a vicious circle. Reducing downforce helps to limit the straight-line deficit, but sacrifices cornering performance and makes it harder to bring the tyres into their correct operating window. That is how the process described by Frédéric Vasseur as a “negative spiral” begins.
In 2026 Formula 1, however, aerodynamic drag does not cost only top speed. It also costs energy. More drag requires greater power to continue accelerating at high speed and, for a given performance target, keeps the electrical component engaged for longer.
A more efficient car can reach the same speed while spending less energy, preserving more deployment for the next part of the lap. That is another reason why Ferrari’s need to reduce downforce on the SF-26 carries particular significance. The team is not merely looking for a few extra kilometres per hour; it is also trying to reduce the energy cost of the straights.
Recorded straight-line performance can be examined through the F1 Top Speed Comparison, which provides additional context for the speed differences between Ferrari and its rivals.
Ferrari’s compromise goes far beyond wing level
The compromise therefore extends well beyond the simple choice of rear wing. Reducing downforce improves straight-line performance, but removes support through corners, complicates tyre behaviour and can worsen precisely the low-speed phases in which Ferrari struggled most at Baku.
The lower-downforce specification is not necessarily the configuration the chassis would prefer for producing the fastest possible lap. Instead, it can become the configuration Ferrari is forced to use because of what is missing in longitudinal performance.
This also helps explain the difference between Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton. Charles Leclerc protected straight-line speed more aggressively, while Lewis Hamilton selected additional downforce in an attempt to generate grip and tyre temperature.
Neither solution completely removed the problem. Charles Leclerc reached the front row but remained more than eight tenths behind George Russell despite receiving a significant slipstream. Lewis Hamilton produced stronger performance through some technical sections but could not make the tyres work consistently and paid a substantial price when running without a tow on the straights.
The season-long comparison between the Ferrari drivers can also be followed through the Charles Leclerc vs Lewis Hamilton F1 head-to-head statistics.
The Ferrari chassis may not be the main weakness
None of this necessarily means Ferrari’s chassis has suddenly become the SF-26’s primary problem. Frédéric Vasseur has actually suggested the opposite: once the estimated power-unit deficit is taken into account, the chassis itself would not currently represent the car’s main weakness.
That is an important distinction because it also changes how the stiffness observed over recent races can be interpreted. Rather than necessarily indicating an intrinsically flawed car, it could form part of the compromise required to reconcile aerodynamics, tyre behaviour and straight-line performance.
The SF-26 had displayed a very stiff platform from the beginning of the season, including at Budapest when the car was still extremely competitive. It is therefore difficult to link that characteristic directly to the technical problem that stopped Charles Leclerc during FP1 in Hungary.
A more plausible interpretation is that the stiffness was already part of the car’s concept, but that the price paid for it has become more obvious at certain circuits as the season has progressed.
Ferrari’s Zandvoort floor development and platform stability
Ferrari also introduced developments after Budapest. At Zandvoort, the team brought a significant revision to the floor, floor edge and diffuser, with the stated aim of making the airflow directed towards the rear diffuser more stable and energetic.
That does not mean the package made the SF-26 worse. On the contrary, it may have increased downforce and improved aerodynamic consistency. But a more effective floor does not automatically make a car mechanically more forgiving.
The flow-turning device positioned in the exhaust area also has to be considered within that wider system. The FTM helps support airflow through the central part of the diffuser and operates within a rear-end architecture developed to extract performance from that area of the car.
The FTM by itself does not make Ferrari stiff. The key point is that the closer the floor and diffuser are pushed towards their maximum efficiency, the more important it becomes to keep the car stable.
If the SF-26 moves excessively under braking, acceleration or through a corner, airflow beneath the floor changes and the aerodynamic balance moves with it. The natural response is to control the platform more tightly.
That is where aerodynamic and mechanical requirements begin pulling in opposite directions.
Why a stiff SF-26 struggles for traction
A very stiff car absorbs kerbs, bumps and rapid load transfers less effectively. Madrid had already demonstrated the issue even though Ferrari’s absolute gap to Mercedes remained relatively contained.
Baku then took the same behaviour to a circuit where traction carries much greater importance. The lap contains heavy braking zones, repeated accelerations from below 100km/h and a succession of 90-degree corners.
At those speeds, aerodynamic contribution decreases and the suspension’s ability to maintain tyre contact with the asphalt becomes decisive.
If the rear of the car is supported too rigidly, even a small bump or rapid load change can momentarily unload the tyre. The driver accelerates, the rear slides and some of the available torque is no longer converted into forward acceleration. That pattern appeared repeatedly on the Ferraris exiting Baku’s slower corners.
Ferrari’s tyre temperature problem adds another layer
The tyre issue then returns to the centre of the discussion. Pirelli had already highlighted on Thursday that grip levels were low and that getting the front axle into the correct window would be particularly difficult.
Lewis Hamilton later described an even broader problem, with difficult rear tyres already in qualifying and entire race stints during which the rubber would not come into temperature.
A sliding car and a tyre that is failing to work correctly are not contradictory conditions. Wheelspin can rapidly generate surface temperature without necessarily bringing the tyre structure into its ideal operating state.
On a very stiff car, the effect can become even more pronounced because more of the work that would normally be absorbed by the suspension is transferred directly into the tyre.
ADUO2 improves Ferrari’s power unit but does not erase the gap
The power unit takes on greater importance when viewed within this wider picture. Ferrari introduced ADUO2 at Monza, the second development step permitted by the regulations. It represented an improvement, but not enough to eliminate the gap – something Ferrari already knew would be the case.
The remaining limitations were visible during the Azerbaijan weekend despite the upgrade, as detailed in the analysis of how Baku continued to expose the SF-26’s limitations following the ADUO2 introduction.
At Baku, the deficit appeared particularly in energy distribution. Through the short acceleration zones of the middle sector, on the run down towards Turn 15 and in parts of the final section, there were phases compatible with more pronounced harvesting and clipping than on the Mercedes.
Publicly available data does not allow the battery state of charge or instantaneous MGU-K output to be known directly, so it would be incorrect to convert those differences into a precise power figure.
However, Lewis Hamilton’s comments after the weekend were significant. Asked what Ferrari currently lacks, Lewis Hamilton described it as “a combination of factors”. When looking ahead to the following races, Lewis Hamilton immediately mentioned Malaysia’s straights and the power demonstrated by Ferrari’s rivals, while expressing slightly more confidence about Singapore because of the reduced number of long full-throttle sections.
That is not an admission of an exclusively engine-related problem, but it is difficult to dismiss it as a minor detail.
How the power-unit deficit changes Ferrari’s entire setup
If lower straight-line efficiency forces Ferrari to remove wing compared with the aerodynamically ideal level, the power-unit deficit stops being only a question of kilometres per hour.
It begins influencing the car’s setup, the grip available through corners and even Ferrari’s ability to maintain its tyres within the correct operating window. That is probably the most significant meaning behind the “negative spiral” described by Frédéric Vasseur.
Ferrari’s rivals have also continued developing, although that alone is not enough to explain the current pattern. McLaren and Red Bull have continued bringing improvements, Mercedes has refined the package introduced in Canada, while Ferrari responded with the new Zandvoort floor and ADUO2 at Monza.
Rather than suddenly losing performance, the SF-26 appears to have narrowed its operating range. It performs well when the platform can remain stable, but struggles considerably more when a circuit demands bump absorption, strong traction and mechanical grip.
The broader Baku picture was also visible during the race, when Ferrari was forced into a defensive position as Mercedes’ stronger performance became increasingly clear.
Sepang could suit Ferrari better, but the straights remain a concern
The next races should therefore provide particularly useful evidence. Sepang is expected to offer Ferrari a more favourable aerodynamic environment than Baku.
The medium-speed corners and long sustained-load sections can reward a stable aerodynamic platform, but Lewis Hamilton has already highlighted the other side of the Malaysian circuit: Sepang also contains significant straights and several acceleration zones where efficiency and power will matter greatly.
It could therefore be a better circuit for the SF-26 without necessarily eliminating its underlying limitations. The characteristics of the Malaysian venue and Lewis Hamilton’s latest Ferrari developments will make the Bahrain Grand Prix an important test of whether the Scuderia can widen its usable performance window.
Singapore will test Ferrari in almost the opposite way
Singapore should represent almost the opposite test. Fewer straights reduce the significance of Ferrari’s longitudinal deficit, but Marina Bay requires substantial traction and a car capable of absorbing the irregularities of a street circuit.
If Ferrari continues to require a very stiff platform, the reduced importance of outright straight-line speed could simply make the mechanical limitation more visible instead.
Austin may provide the most revealing test
Austin could be the most interesting event of the three. The first sector and long, fast corners may suit a precise and aerodynamically stable car, but the Circuit of the Americas has traditionally been bumpy, making it demanding for a stiff platform.
Most importantly, Ferrari has planned another aerodynamic intervention around that stage of the season, as previously reported by AutoRacer, while Frédéric Vasseur has confirmed that the updates will arrive “soon”.
The key question will therefore not simply be how many tenths the new package adds. The more significant issue is whether Ferrari can generate the same level of downforce while widening the SF-26’s operating window and restoring greater setup freedom to its engineers.
If Ferrari succeeds, it could recover something more valuable than pure absolute performance: the ability to adapt the SF-26 to different circuits without repeatedly deciding which area of performance must be sacrificed.
Ferrari’s real problem may be how difficult its performance is to access
Baku showed perhaps the most extreme version of the problem. Ferrari has to search simultaneously for straight-line speed, tyre temperature and platform stability.
Removing downforce helps with the first requirement but can worsen the other two. Adding aerodynamic load can improve tyre behaviour and cornering performance, but makes the longitudinal deficit more obvious and raises the energy cost of the straights.
It is therefore difficult to identify one single cause. In that respect, Lewis Hamilton may have provided the most effective description: “It’s a combination of factors.”
Ferrari’s problem may ultimately be exactly that. The SF-26 has not necessarily become a suddenly slow Formula 1 car since Budapest. Instead, it appears to remain a car with genuine performance but fewer and fewer ways of accessing all of that performance at the same time.
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