Mercedes has the fastest car and leads both championships, but things aren’t nearly as comfortable as you might’ve assumed after the team’s dominant start to the season.
With the mid-season break in sight just two races from now, Mercedes is tallying the points lost to chronic unreliability.
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Ferrari has ensured those problems haven’t been kept under control. The Italian team has surged forward in the last three rounds to expose certain fragilities in Mercedes’s car, like title leader Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s bizarre wheel shield failure that cost him a likely victory in Silverstone.
“We have a car capable of fighting at the front and scoring heavily, but we have not converted that potential into the best possible results,” Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said.
“Reliability issues have cost us points, and in a championship this competitive, that is something we cannot afford.
“We have left too much on the table recently. We need to make sure that doesn’t happen again starting this weekend.
“There is no value in having the pace if we don’t bring home the result.”
Those reliability problems have kept Ferrari within striking distance on the title table long enough to upgrade its way into genuine contention.
It arrives in Belgium having won two of the last three grands prix, a proposition that would have seemed totally improbable only a month or so ago.
Mercedes’s lead has been slashed to 78 points. Antonelli’s lead over Lewis Hamilton in third is just 32 points, while Charles Leclerc is clinging on to contention at 71 points adrift.
With just two rounds remaining before the mid-season break, is the complexion of the championship beginning to change?
‘F*** THIS’ Verstappen rages after crash | 01:09
CAN FERRARI REPEAT ITS SILVERSTONE SURPRISE?
The nature of Ferrari’s wins tells us something about its form.
Hamilton’s victory in Barcelona was dominant, even accounting for the virtual safety car that guaranteed it, and though Leclerc’s win in the UK was more fortunate thanks to Antonelli’s technical problems, it was no less heartening for how competitive the Ferrari was.
It’s a circuit that shouldn’t have suited the scarlet car, yet it was fast enough to force Mercedes to resort to strategy in a bid to get the lead.
It’s raised hopes that Ferrari should at least be competitive at ‘average’ circuits less sensitive to engine performance. Next week’s Hungarian Grand Prix, as the slow and twisty Hungaroring, could see the pendulum swing towards the Scuderia, for example.
PIT TALK PODCAST: Speculation hits fever pitch over a possible Max Verstappen defection from Red Bull Racing — but what are his options, and is McLaren realistically one of them? Plus: we look ahead to this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix, the first of the final two races before the midseason break. | Listen to Pit Talk here >
At the height of the European season, this is the moment for Ferrari to try to state its case.
“It’s time to really crack the whip and do better,” Hamilton said, per the F1 website. “I don’t know what to expect this weekend. if I’m honest. with longer straights, but … I’m really proud of the team and incremental steps that we’re taking.
“It’s a combination of a lot of things: better execution through the weekends, better understanding of the car, how hard the team has worked to develop the car and move it in the direction that both drivers are pushing it towards.”
Spa-Francorchamps makes similar demands of the car to Silverstone, rewarding efficient aerodynamics that can generate downforce for the high-speed corners without sacrificing too much straight-line speed for the long flat-out blasts.
It is, though, potentially a little bit less critical for the battery, with more big braking zones and some slower corners to help recover energy. That should, in theory, benefit Ferrari, given this is an area in which Mercedes excels.
Leclerc, though, was refusing to buy into the hype.
“For me, Silverstone and Spa are two tracks that will suit Mercedes a lot better,” he said. “At Silverstone it was honestly a surprise for us also to be strong, but we were also lucky on the Sunday, because Kimi was probably as strong as what we expected.
“I think in Spa Mercedes is still the favourite.”
Though Ferrari can’t afford many more heavy losses this season, the difference between victory and defeat this weekend won’t necessarily define the team’s championship hopes.
Defeat at one of the sport’s most extreme, high-speed circuits wouldn’t be disastrous if Ferrari were relatively competitive, similar to Silverstone.
With another engine upgrade due after the mid-season break, Ferrari might still have Mercedes in range.
McLAREN MAKES PENALTY CALL FOR LAST RACE BEFORE UPGRADE
Lando Norris and Piastri arrive in Belgium as the reigning pole-getter and race-winner respectively, but they’re not expected to repeat either feat this weekend.
Aside from McLaren’s relative lack of competitiveness, Norris starts the weekend carrying a 10-place grid penalty for an engine change.
Both McLaren drivers will receive new engines this weekend, which will tip the reigning champion over his limit for a particular component.
Ironically that’s because the component in question — the control electronics — terminally failed in China, leaving him unable to start the race.
Piastri is now on the bubble too, having used all three of his ‘free’ control electronics units.
McLaren has consciously selected Spa-Francorchamps as the circuit to serve the penalty, as the track is generally conducive to overtaking — more so, at least, than the upcoming races in Hungary and the Netherlands.
It’s a penalty strategy Verstappen has used to great effect at Spa in the past. He started the 2022 Belgian Grand Prix from 14th and won the race, and he did the same from sixth in 2023. He started 11th and finished fourth in 2024.
“[I’ve] just got to take it on the chin and deal with some of the penalties that I have coming up, but this is certainly a better track to take the penalties than the next two,” Norris said. “It’s part of it, but we can still look forward to try and have a good weekend.”
McLaren will use its new rear wing — a take on the Ferrari rotating device — this weekend too, in another small boost after Silverstone, one of its least competitive weekends of the year.
Belgium is also one of Piastri’s best tracks — he’s scored more points at Spa-Francorchamps than he has anywhere bar Qatar.
But there’s little optimism for a victory charge before the team’s big upgrade package due next weekend in Hungary.
“I’m probably not going to be able to repeat the results of last year unfortunately, but it’s always a fun track to drive,” he said.
“For this weekend, I’m not sure where we’re going to sit. We’re going to be similar to where we have been, which is probably the third or fourth quickest car, depending on how competitive Red Bull look, really. That’s just the reality of where we are at the moment.
“We’ll try our best this weekend and see what comes our way, and then try and get on the front foot from Budapest onwards.”
Verstappen crashes out in British GP | 02:19
CAN RUSSELL GENERATE ANY MOMENTUM?
It might sound odd to say for a driver who has taken 43 points out of his title deficit over the last three rounds, but George Russell is in dire need of some momentum.
The pre-season favourite has been smacked around by his teammate almost all year. Not since the season-opening Australian Grand Prix has he looked compelling as Mercedes’s lead driver, with Antonelli taking the ascendancy almost immediately afterwards with five consecutive grand prix victories.
Some poor luck was part of that story, but Antonelli’s almost equal misfortune in recent races has reset the ledger, with even Russell acknowledging that his 25-point deficit was reflective of his underperformance relative to his teammate.
“This year we’ve seen a lot of trends that my style isn’t quite suiting what the power unit needs, what the tyres need, and we’re just needing to adapt the set-up to something that I’ve not really run before,” he explained.
“It’s kind of forcing me to drive a bit more consciously rather than subconsciously, which is also a bit of a negative. I’m hoping I’m in a bit of a learning pit before I can then take advantage of those learnings.
“I guess it’s like a golfer changing his swing — it’s probably going to take a small step backwards first, and then you relearn that new swing and it’s better. That feels a little bit where I’m at at the moment.”
He needs to move past that sooner rather than later, however.
If Ferrari’s challenge is sustained, it may not take long for Mercedes to begin wondering whether it needs to be prioritising one driver to maximise the odds of claiming the title.
Russell has yet to argue convincingly that he should be that driver. Antonelli isn’t allowing him to.
Despite the teenager’s inexperience, he’s been performing relentlessly all season — he’s been beaten by Russell only once since Australia: in Austria, where yellow flags confusion was a major contributor.
It’s only that unreliability has struck him twice in the last three races that his margin has been so dramatically reduced.
“It’s very frustrating, but this is motorsport, so things like this happen,” he said.
“The pace is good and the momentum is still there despite a few difficulties that we had previously. That’s a real positive.
“I just need to deliver and try to maximise all the things that I have in my control. The rest, I cannot really do much about it, other than just try to drive as fast as I can and keep delivering in performances.”
As we fast approach the halfway point of the season, there’s no real sign of the dynamic changing inside Mercedes.
Cam Waters aiming for the Championship? | 01:03
RED BULL RACING ROLLS BACK UPGRADES AS VERSTAPPEN RUMOURS CONTINUE
Though Oscar Piastri rebuffed speculation that he could be replaced by Max Verstappen at McLaren next season, the Dutchman wasn’t anywhere near as equivocal about his future with Red Bull Racing, which remains in doubt.
Verstappen is widely believed to be able to exit his contract if he’s outside the top two in the championship after next weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix. His failure to finish the British Grand Prix has made that a mathematical certainty.
It’s not just about the contractual situation, however. Verstappen has complained that the technical team has ignored his feedback at least twice this year — including in Silverstone — and has since described this year’s Red Bull Racing car as “dangerous” for having thrown him off the road twice in as many weekends.
The situation was so frustrating that he said on Sunday in Silverstone that he needed time away from the team to calm down and refocus.
It speaks to what appears to be a general lack of faith in the direction of the team, which as recently as three years ago set records for domination in Formula 1.
This weekend Red Bull Racing has taken off its rotating rear wing, the culprit behind Verstappen’s two high-speed crashes. Whether that supports or refutes Verstappen’s belief is still to be seen.
He remained noncommittal about his future in Belgium, but he said he remains focused on improving the team’s competitive situation regardless.
“We’re just looking to the future, trying to fix the current issues that we have on the car, but that’s a very open discussion,” he said.
“Sometimes you get a little bit disappointed or upset after a race, but, for example, after Silverstone you go home, you reset. On Wednesday I was back at the factory, and then you prepare again for the weekends ahead.
“That’s how we’ve been operating all the years together. Of course some years you’re just a little bit more competitive than others, but in terms of my approach and how we work as a team, nothing really changes.”
Verstappen’s potential loss to the team would in a sense be only one of many, with a long list of technical staff having departed in recent seasons. The most recent is chief engineer Paul Monaghan, who has been put on gardening leave ahead of a reported switch to Cadillac.
“People come and go,” Verstappen said. “I think that’s sometimes also part of the process.
“Sometimes you want people to stay, potentially, yes, but I think that’s just how life is and how sport is as well.
“You just have to carry on and try to find new talent. That’s what you also look at all the time, and that’s what we do.”
Perhaps a message for his team as much as it is for himself.
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