Lewis Hamilton believes Ferrari’s handling difficulties during the opening two stints of the 2026 United States Grand Prix were the main reason he missed out on a podium finish at Austin. The seven-time Formula 1 world champion eventually finished fourth, just 1.020 seconds behind Max Verstappen, after finding considerably stronger pace in the closing stages. However, he admitted that the time lost while struggling with understeer in the SF-26 left him with too much ground to recover.
A late Virtual Safety Car, triggered by Valtteri Bottas’s stranded Cadillac, prevented Hamilton from completing his attack on the Red Bull driver. Yet the Ferrari driver was reluctant to attribute the missed opportunity entirely to that interruption. Instead, he identified a more fundamental concern: his car had taken two complete stints to begin responding as he wanted, and only during the final part of the race could he match the pace of the leading competitors.
Lewis Hamilton identifies Ferrari’s early understeer as the decisive Austin problem
Although Lewis Hamilton finished within striking distance of third place, his race had been compromised long before the closing laps. Throughout the opening two stints, the British driver struggled to make the SF-26 turn effectively, preventing him from maintaining the pace needed to stay close to the cars ahead.
Hamilton explained after the Grand Prix that he had lost substantial time during those two phases of the race. He recognised that such deficits could not continue if he wanted to challenge consistently for stronger results, particularly against rivals capable of maintaining competitive pace throughout a Grand Prix.
The main difficulty was understeer, with the Ferrari lacking the front-end response the seven-time world champion needed. The problem persisted for much of the afternoon, leaving Hamilton unable to exploit the car’s potential until the final stint.
Once the SF-26 began turning more effectively, the situation changed. The British driver was able to recover pace and start matching the competitors ahead, providing an encouraging contrast with his earlier struggles.
Those difficulties formed part of the wider Ferrari balance problems Lewis Hamilton identified following the United States Grand Prix, which had complicated his attempts to extract consistent performance from the car throughout the weekend.
Fresh tyres help Lewis Hamilton close rapidly on Max Verstappen
The final stint transformed Lewis Hamilton’s race. Running on fresher tyres than Max Verstappen, the Ferrari driver began reducing the gap to the Red Bull, making the most of his improved handling and the additional grip available from his tyres.
Verstappen was running on the hard compound, while Hamilton’s stronger pace allowed him to close the distance between the two cars. After struggling during the opening phases, the seven-time world champion finally had the opportunity to challenge for a position on the podium.
The recovery also included an overtake on Lando Norris, which helped Hamilton move into fourth place and continue his pursuit of Verstappen. The Ferrari driver was able to make significant progress during the closing stages, but the time lost earlier meant that he still faced a difficult task.
Hamilton later explained that he would have welcomed the opportunity to battle Verstappen during the final couple of laps. He believed that the closing stages could have produced an exciting contest, although he did not claim that overtaking the Red Bull driver would have been guaranteed.
The late recovery demonstrated how different the outcome might have been had the SF-26 delivered its final-stint performance earlier in the Grand Prix. However, the gap accumulated across the first two stints continued to influence the result, even as Hamilton began setting a much more competitive pace.
Readers can explore how drivers moved through the field during the race using the F1 Race Position and Progression Tracker, which provides lap-by-lap comparisons and shows how pit stops and race interruptions affect the running order.
Late Virtual Safety Car ends Ferrari’s chance of an Austin podium battle
With Lewis Hamilton closing on Max Verstappen, the final laps appeared set to provide a direct battle for third place. The Ferrari driver had fresher tyres and was reducing the gap, but the situation changed when Valtteri Bottas’s Cadillac became stranded.
The incident prompted the deployment of the Virtual Safety Car, reducing the number of remaining racing laps available for Hamilton to attack. Under VSC conditions, drivers must respect the prescribed speed restrictions, preventing the British driver from continuing his pursuit at normal racing pace.
The interruption therefore provided Verstappen with an important advantage at a moment when his position was coming under increasing pressure. Hamilton eventually crossed the finish line 1.020 seconds behind the Red Bull driver, narrowly missing the final podium position.
However, when asked whether the Virtual Safety Car had cost him third place, Hamilton focused on the wider circumstances of his race. He acknowledged that the interruption had deprived him of a possible late battle, but stressed that the decisive damage had already been done during the first two stints.
The seven-time world champion believed he had driven well and was pleased with his own performance. His frustration centred instead on the amount of time he had surrendered while trying to find a workable balance in the Ferrari.
Lewis Hamilton believes Ferrari must find its race pace earlier
Hamilton’s assessment highlighted a clear priority for Ferrari. The SF-26 eventually became competitive enough for him to match the pace of the cars ahead, but the improvement arrived too late to undo the consequences of the opening stages.
The British driver explained that it had taken two entire stints before the car began to respond properly. Once its handling improved, he was able to return to a competitive rhythm and launch his late recovery.
He also referred to the considerable gap to race winner Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who was approximately 18 seconds ahead, acknowledging the strong pace demonstrated by the leading cars. Hamilton recognised that he needed to work on reducing the time lost during the less competitive phases of future races.
The issue was therefore not simply whether Ferrari had enough speed to challenge Max Verstappen at the end of the United States Grand Prix. It was whether the team could provide Hamilton with a car capable of delivering that level of performance consistently, rather than requiring much of the race to find an effective balance.
That challenge has particular importance for the remaining rounds of the season, when even relatively small differences in performance could affect the final championship positions.
Ferrari drivers remain in a close fight for second in the 2026 F1 standings
The United States Grand Prix also intensified the battle for second place in the 2026 Formula 1 Drivers’ Championship. Following Austin, four drivers were separated by just nine points, creating a closely contested fight behind the championship leader.
George Russell remained at the head of that group, with Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen positioned between the Mercedes driver and Charles Leclerc, who was also within striking distance. The narrow gaps meant that individual positions in the final classification could have an important influence on the championship battle.
For Hamilton, the difference between finishing third and fourth in Austin was therefore significant beyond the disappointment of missing another podium. Every point remained valuable in a contest involving both Ferrari drivers and two of their closest rivals.
The closing stages demonstrated that the British driver had enough pace to put Verstappen under pressure, but also revealed why Ferrari could not afford to surrender so much time earlier in the race. The late Virtual Safety Car removed the possibility of a final attack, while the SF-26’s handling difficulties had already made the recovery more demanding than it needed to be.
Lewis Hamilton left Austin convinced that the biggest obstacle to his podium ambitions was not the late interruption, but the understeer that compromised his first two stints. Ferrari eventually found a more competitive balance, allowing him to finish just over a second behind Max Verstappen, but the seven-time world champion believes the team must avoid repeating those early losses if it wants to challenge for stronger results.
Leave a Reply