Mercedes boss Toto Wolff praises Ferrari’s step forward after British GP. Toto Wolff: Ferrari has improved, but Mercedes' biggest concern is reliability.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff believes Ferrari has made noticeable progress in recent races, although he insists the Scuderia is not yet a team to fear. Instead, the Austrian pointed to Mercedes’ growing reliability concerns, which he says have already cost the team a significant number of championship points during the opening phase of the 2026 Formula 1 season.

The championship battle tightened at Silverstone

“The Mercedes cars will disappear into the distance over a race stint.” That was Lewis Hamilton’s verdict after Saturday’s qualifying session at Silverstone, with the seven-time Formula 1 World Champion expressing a rather pessimistic view of Ferrari’s chances in the British Grand Prix.

According to Lewis Hamilton, even if the Ferrari SF-26s had managed to take the lead at the start, they would have struggled to keep the Mercedes drivers behind over a full race distance because of the Silver Arrows’ superior long-run pace.

At the start of the race, however, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton immediately overtook Andrea Kimi Antonelli, with the young Italian spending much of the opening stint trying to find a way past the British driver.

In the closing stages, Andrea Kimi Antonelli appeared to be on course for what looked like a relatively straightforward chase of Charles Leclerc, thanks to a significant tyre advantage. However, a technical problem ended those hopes and prevented him from following up his Sprint victory with another strong result.

Toto Wolff praises Ferrari’s progress but focuses on Mercedes‘ reliability

Speaking to Sky, Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff acknowledged that Ferrari has clearly improved, although he stopped short of describing the Italian team as a genuine threat.

“Am I afraid of Ferrari? No. We have to focus on ourselves because we’ve lost 75 points due to reliability problems. Ferrari has taken a step forward. They expected to be less competitive at Silverstone, but during the first stint of the race their pace was actually very similar to ours.”

While Wolff recognised Ferrari’s recent gains, he made it clear that Mercedes’ priority remains addressing the reliability issues that have undermined its championship campaign. With valuable points already lost to technical failures, solving those problems is likely to be just as important as finding additional performance in the races ahead.