The European leg of the Formula 1 season has ended, and as summer turns to autumn in the northern hemisphere, teams have precious little time to digest its lessons.
The season comes thick and fast now, with nine grands prix scheduled over the next 11 weekends, a brutal program that will test all 11 teams and expose their weaknesses.
The championship is likely all but sewn up, but every team will take a key objective into the final phase of the season — something that will ensure they’ve got something out of the campaign to take into 2027.
Fox Sports, available on Kayo Sports, is the only place to watch every practice, qualifying session and race in the 2026 FIA Formula One World Championship™ LIVE in 4K. New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.
Not every team will succeed.
MERCEDES NEEDS… THE SEALING UPGRADE
Mercedes has played a high-risk iterative upgrade plan with its 2026 car. Despite its early domination of the sport, its grip has slackened progressively over the season as other teams have caught up with massive upgrade after massive upgrade.
After taking the first 10 poles of the season, it’s claimed just one of the last four. It won the first six grands prix in a row but has won only half of the last eight races — and it would’ve been less than that had the VSC not benefited Andrea Kimi Antonelli in Madrid.
McLaren appears to believe Lando Norris could close his 106-point title deficit. McLaren is an unlikely 197 points behind Mercedes on the constructors table, while Ferrari is a little closer, at 145 points adrift.
These are big margins, but it’s true also that momentum has been moving away from Mercedes.
The success of its go-slow upgrade strategy will be decided in the next fortnight, when it brings its one remaining upgrade at the Malaysian Grand Prix.
“Hopefully we’ll make a decent step,” trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin told the Silver Arrows Radio Show podcast.
“I don’t think we’re going to be out front by miles, but hopefully we’ll be back into a position where we can really go into qualifying knowing that we’re fighting for pole.”
If it can reassert dominance, then its championship-winning moment will come into view as soon as the United States Grand Prix in late October.
Horror pit stop costs Norris the lead | 00:44
FERRARI NEEDS… COMPOSURE (AND SPEED)
What on paper should have been a highly productive run of races for Ferrari on either side of the mid-season break has instead been a phenomenal disappointment.
The team hasn’t touched the podium since the Belgian Grand Prix way back in July. What at first was a story of missed chances and fumbled strategies has become one of being jumped by McLaren and gradually seeing those mid-year gains washed away.
It’s opened up all the same old wounds we’re used to seeing at the Italian team.
Friction and disagreement have spilt into the public sphere. Lewis Hamilton has been forced to deny reports that he’s agitating for staff changes. There are further reports his relationship with team boss Frédéric Vasseur has weakened — and that Vasseur is not totally secure in the top job.
True or not, it’s the sort of stuff that’s eaten away at Ferrari historically.
Hamilton knows the title is gone, and Ferrari must know deep down it’s not going to catch Mercedes. But it needs to end the year strongly — and developing the sort of composure it needs to have a better crack next season.
To do so will also require the next round of upgrades to deliver, having delayed them for more wind tunnel time. When they finally arrive next month, they must restore some of the momentum from the middle of the season lest Ferrari end the year looking directionless — and lest infighting resurface.
Piastri’s race ruined by opening clash | 00:32
McLAREN NEEDS… PIASTRI BACK IN THE FIGHT
McLaren has almost certainly left it too late to defend either championship this year — though CEO Zak Brown remains optimistic the season is still alive — but the team’s momentum is no less important.
Having changed development tack and delivered a race-winning car — the fastest car at three of the last four grands prix — McLaren is mounting a credible case to be considered Mercedes’s chief rival next season, when it can begin rebuilding its dynasty.
To do so, though, it will need Oscar Piastri in the fight.
In 2024 and 2025 Oscar Piastri was the highest-scoring driver during the European season. This year, however, he couldn’t find his groove.
Drivers championship, European season
1. Andrea Kimi Antonelli: 161 points
2. Lando Norris: 128 points
3. George Russell: 123 points
4. Lewis Hamilton: 119 points
5. Max Verstappen: 102 points
6. Charles Leclerc: 92 points
7. Oscar Piastri: 72 points
8. Isack Hadjar: 57 points
Piastri’s score gap has repercussions for the constructors championship too.
Constructors championship, European season
1. Mercedes: 284 points
2. Ferrari: 211 points
3. McLaren: 200 points
4. Red Bull Racing: 165 points
The reasons for Piastri’s struggles boil down largely to a driving style that he hasn’t been able to match to the car. Team principal Andrea Stella says the team will be helping Piastri with some of the techniques it used to haul Norris back into contention in the middle of last season.
Piastri will be itching to get himself back into title contention next year and write off 2026 as a necessary learning season during which neither championship was genuinely up for grabs.
McLaren must get him there, because having the car but not both drivers in the fight won’t be enough to claim the constructors title.
Lando refuses to ditch the Coca-Cola! | 00:17
RED BULL RACING NEEDS… A VICTORY, ANY VICTORY
Max Verstappen hasn’t had a winless season in Formula 1 since claiming his maiden in 2016.
He’s also never waited longer than 15 rounds for his first win — and this weekend is round 15.
The team that dominated the 2023 season so ruthlessly has yet to really fire a shot this season.
Verstappen has no wins and only six podiums from 14 rounds, and each top-three finish has seemed more miraculous than the last, won largely off the back of the four-time champion’s individual brilliance.
Throughout, however, he’s complained about a car with myriad problems, including a feeling that the car is aerodynamically degrading over a race stint, almost as though it were picking up damage with every lap.
That frustration is combined with the bizarre engine concession situation that has resulted in Red Bull Powertrains being judged to have the best internal combustion engine and therefore denied upgrade chances offered to every other manufacturer.
There’s a feeling that Red Bull Racing didn’t play the political game strongly enough as other brands attempted to game the concession measurement system — a highly uncharacteristic accusation by historical standards for this team.
The gains that were made after the team’s dire start to the season have plateaued, leaving it adrift of the top three.
Despite Red Bull Racing having locked down Verstappen on a longer contract this year, the problems at the heart of the team that triggered speculation that the Dutchman could exit largely remain. One crisis may have been averted, but the sense of listlessness has yet to be cleared.
“Tell me if you’re going to fix it!” | 00:48
RACING BULLS NEEDS… LIAM LAWSON BACK
With all due respect to Yuki Tsunoda, who did admirably in his last-minute call-up, Racing Bulls could really use Liam Lawson back at the helm.
Lawson has been key to the team sitting fifth in the standings, having never finished a season higher than sixth in its decades-long history, predating even Red Bull’s ownership.
Before the Dutch Grand Prix, Lawson had almost twice the score of rookie teammate Arvid Lindblad, and though Lindblad has done well in the Kiwi’s absence, chances for bigger scores have gone begging as Tsunoda found his feat in F1 2026.
In the three rounds Lawson has been at Red Bull Racing, Alpine has outscored Racing Bulls 16-7, closing the gap in the battle for fifth to just nine points.
Red Bull Racing has yet to confirm whether Isack Hadjar will return from injury this weekend.
Racing Bulls will surely be hoping the Frenchman is fighting fit so that it can get its leader back to seal its best-ever title finish.
F1 backs Middle East return in 2027 | 00:54
ALPINE NEEDS… CONSISTENCY FROM FRANCO COLAPINTO
Alpine has been able to count on a greater points contribution from Franco Colapinto — not difficult when the Argentine was scoreless last season — but though the pace has returned, the consistency is still a work in progress.
Take qualifying as an example. Colapinto is on average 0.242s slower than Gasly — the second-largest margin in the sport, though by no means a thrashing — but when he’s behind, he’s 0.455s behind.
He’s on average qualifying 2.3 places behind Gasly, but when he’s behind, he’s 4.4 places behind — and it’s much the same in the race, when his average 2.2-place deficit blows out to 4.2 places.
Heartening is that Colapinto has shown a greater propensity to pick up the pieces on the rare weekends Gasly hasn’t been able to — like in Madrid, when he made Q3 and scored in his teammate’s absence.
But what could last year’s last-placed team achieve in 2026 if Colapinto could raise his floor?
Kimi Antonelli claims Spanish Grand Prix | 01:32
HAAS NEEDS… MORE FUNDING
Despite Cadillac being a brand-new team in 2026, Haas is still the smallest constructor in Formula 1.
The reason boils down to owner Gene Haas being willing to tip only so much money into the team, even as it continues punching above its weight.
It means Haas is the only team not hitting the US$215 million (A$301.3 million) budget cap. Already under-resourced via infrastructure, it’s also effectively fighting with one arm behind its back.
The budget cap has done a lot of lifting to reduce and contain field spread in Formula 1, but Haas’s inability to reach it also explains why the team tends to start seasons well and then slide backwards — it is, bar Williams, the team sliding down the order fastest this year.
Without more money, the team can’t expand staff or upgrade facilities.
But team principal Ayao Komatsu says he is “very positive” about next year’s financial proposition amid rumours that he’s close to signing BWT, the current Alpine title sponsor.
It’s no exaggeration to say a major sponsorship deal would change this team’s outlook. At a time an increasing number of teams are backed by manufacturers or big spenders, Haas risks being permanently left behind without it.
CARNAGE as Max takes on 100 drivers | 02:04
AUDI NEEDS… BETTER STARTS
Audi has made a reputable start to its Formula 1 history, even if it already owned the former Sauber team prior to this year’s rebranding.
Given that acquisition, the biggest question has been its first-ever F1 engine. Again, it’s been a commendable effort, but it has some notable rough edges.
The starts are the biggest one.
Across 18 starts — 14 grands prix and four sprints — Nico Hülkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto have lost a cumulative 68 places, by far the most of any team.
On average its drivers are dropping 2.1 places per start.
The next-worst constructor is Red Bull Racing, which has shipped a cumulative 43 places in that time — but Red Bull Racing is starting higher up the grid, where there’s more to lose.
Every other midfield team — including both Haas and Alpine, just ahead on the title table — both gain around one place on average off the line.
When the battle for points is so tight, the starts make a difference.
2027 Aussie Grand Prix gets sprint race | 01:29
WILLIAMS NEEDS… ITS BAKU UPGRADE TO WORK
Williams overperformed last year with its comfortable fifth, which has made this year’s underperformance look even worse than it already is.
The car was late to debut in testing due to development problems — despite having given up on its 2025 car earlier than almost anyone else to get a jump on 2026 — and when it did hit the track, it was overweight and slow.
Though it took some small step forward during the year, it’s been moving further and further back on one-lap pace. It’s been ahead of only Cadillac and Aston Martin for the last three weekends — and it was behind Aston four rounds ago, in Hungary.
The team has focused its resources on a big upgrade due this weekend in Baku, but it’s already attempted to talk down its potential. Effectively it’s putting this year in the bin in the hope of starting fresh in 2027.
But this weekend’s upgrade has to work. While James Vowles has emphasised the team has decades-old structural issues that will take time to rectify, it needs some reason to hope that the trajectory exceeded last year wasn’t wrong.
Acosta crashes out of Austria Sprint | 01:12
ASTON MARTIN NEEDS… RULE CHANGES IN ITS FAVOUR
Aston Martin hoped for so much more this season, but a combination of a dire debut car and Honda’s problematic power unit has left it anchored to the back of the grid, battling only with Cadillac most weekends.
An almost certain 10th in the championship is far, far below expectations for the big-spending team.
But the season might not be totally wasted.
Fernando Alonso’s reticence to confirm whether he’ll keep racing next year — paddock consensus is that he almost certainly will — appears to have given the team and Honda some leverage to urge for rule changes in their favour.
FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem said in Madrid last weekend that he was open to changing the rules to ensure the final chapter of Alonso’s career wouldn’t be so grim.
Reports since have suggested that Ben Sulayem was referring to work ongoing behind the scenes with other teams and manufacturers to change the engine concession rules to help Honda catch up more quickly.
After all, this was supposed to be the purpose of the concession rule; the idea that the regulations have given Ferrari and Honda the same benefits — and that Mercedes has also got a concession upgrade — demonstrates the work to do.
Alonso, forever a wily political operator, and Aston Martin could be the combination to break the inertia around correcting this regulation.
At least that would mean they’d have got something out of this year.
Acosta claims MotoGP win | 01:42
CADILLAC NEEDS… TO FINISH SOME RACES
Cadillac has made a perfectly respectable start to life as a Formula 1 team. Some thought the American brand would be lucky to qualify for races at all; instead it spent much of the first half of the year outperforming Aston Martin.
But it’s hard not to feel that it’s hit something of a ceiling in the middle of the year. Both Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas have said as much publicly in different ways, and the executive obviously thinks similarly given it axed team principal Graeme Lowdon during the mid-season break.
Only five times this season has Cadillac got both cars to the finish, and most concerning is the number of times the failures to finish have been caused by recurring problems, most notably overheating brakes.
It’s left Cadillac having completed only 6212km or racing out of a possible maximum of 8482km.
That’s 2270km less experience working as a team, understanding the car’s performance, debugging reliability issues.
Kilometres are what matter to new teams, and if Cadillac is to take a step forward next year, kilometres are what it needs from the final stage of the season.