After more than a month of break and intense development work on the SF-26, Ferrari arrived in Florida for the Miami Grand Prix with the ambition of challenging Mercedes, who had dominated the season up to that point. The Silver Arrows, despite running a W17 without substantial new upgrades, secured their fourth victory of the 2026 campaign. Meanwhile, Ferrari introduced the most significant upgrade package on the grid, surpassing even its rivals McLaren and Red Bull.
On the SF-26, the so-called “Macarena” rear wing made its debut, along with a new floor, a revised front wing, an updated FTM, a different front suspension mounting, and several innovations in software and energy management of the 067/6 power unit. Despite all these changes, the Scuderia remains the third force on the grid, with the clear impression that the car has not improved enough to consistently challenge its rivals in all conditions and fully dream of victory.
Good… halfway there
In clean air, as shown by Charles Leclerc’s strong opening stint in the race, the Ferrari looked comfortable. However, in traffic, the SF-26 appeared to lose balance. Leclerc began struggling after suffering unexpected tyre overheating, which cost him significant pace. This situation highlighted that Ferrari did not have the race pace to fight for the podium, especially considering that Leclerc only set the fifth fastest lap of the race, six-tenths slower than Andrea Kimi Antonelli.
This is a significant gap, mainly attributed to clear engine deficiencies, with some estimating a shortfall of around 30 horsepower compared to Mercedes’ internal combustion unit. These are shortcomings that, as many had hoped, cannot be solved simply through energy management software updates, which may not have delivered the expected gains from the engineers. Instead, improvement appears only possible through additional work with the ADUO system, which Ferrari engineers at Maranello are currently developing intensively, despite facing several technical challenges.
Hamilton, the return of the same old story
In short, Miami delivered a harsh reality check for Ferrari after the break, which had fuelled optimism among fans. Much of that optimism came from pre-race simulations. However, Lewis Hamilton strongly criticised this aspect, admitting that the “virtual” homework had been misleading.
The eternal return of the same old pattern for Ferrari has once again emerged, as the team appears to have lost correlation between factory data and real-world track performance. “In the end it’s a matter of correlation,” said Lewis. “We do simulations and then we go to the track and the car behaves differently. I don’t like the simulator, but I used it to prepare for this race. It didn’t help. I won’t use it for Canada. I will attend the meetings. In China I had my best weekend without the simulator. I will only attend the meetings. I want to take a break and see.”
This represents yet another issue for Ferrari, which, in addition to waiting for improvements from the ADUO development programme, will also need to dedicate time to fixing its so-called “tools” and improving overall correlation between simulation and on-track performance.
