{"id":418666,"date":"2026-01-17T08:07:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T08:07:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/418666\/"},"modified":"2026-01-17T08:07:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T08:07:09","slug":"how-will-the-main-players-fare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/418666\/","title":{"rendered":"How will the main players fare?"},"content":{"rendered":"

While the main talk ahead of the 2026 Formula 1<\/a> season is about how the teams will respond to the new regulations, it would be interesting to see how some of the drivers will perform.<\/p>\n

A lot of what these drivers can or cannot do will be based on the packages that their teams put at their disposal.<\/p>\n

Max Verstappen<\/a> suffered with Red Bull’s moody RB21 in 2025, which cost him a fifth F1 Title. He will be hoping that his team deliver a better weapon in 2026, but they have the challenge of delivering their first-ever in-house-built power unit, which they are working on with Ford.<\/p>\n

Audi also are coming into the sport fresh, having taken over Sauber, but are developing their own power unit as well.<\/p>\n

Mercedes are expected to dominate, but recent reports<\/a> claim they have issues, while Ferrari will have nowhere to hide in 2026.<\/p>\n

Former F1 driver Johnny Herbert commented: “We don’t know who will win the championship yet. I’ve heard Ford is struggling with Red Bull.<\/p>\n

“Audi have had a lot of time to prepare for this year. Ferrari are expected to improve every year, especially after the disaster last year.”<\/p>\n

2025’s title contenders will have another go?\"verstappenGoing into the driver talk, Herbert started with Lando Norris<\/a>, of whom he said: “He’s grown so much during the 2025 season; now he’ll be a stronger and more complete driver this season.<\/p>\n

“Oscar Piastri will need to rebuild his confidence and prove he’s the stronger driver of the pair, and Lando knows that.<\/p>\n

“It’s down to McLaren to give them the tools to be able to show the same speed they showed last year.<\/p>\n

“McLaren have to start the season strong like they did before, but they know teams will be a lot closer this year,” he maintained.<\/p>\n

As for Verstappen, who will be monitoring the sport’s landscape in 2026 before deciding his future<\/a>, Herbert said: “Max Verstappen will always be pushing himself, but more importantly, pushing Red Bull, making sure they’re heading in the right direction.<\/p>\n

“We saw that midway through last season, Red Bull were good at certain circuits, but they became very strong towards the end.<\/p>\n

“Max drove beautifully in Abu Dhabi, he was very comfortable in the car,” the winner of three Grands Prix maintained.<\/p>\n

Mercedes\"mercedesMercedes will continue with an unchanged driver lineup in 2026, with Kimi Antonelli<\/a> no longer a rookie while George Russell<\/a> continues to grow into the team leader role.<\/p>\n

“George Russell will be very important in the resurgence of Mercedes,” Herbert said. “They want to be right at the very front again.<\/p>\n

“George can improve by being pushed by Kimi Antonelli<\/a> too. Consistency is the main thing dividing their competitiveness at the moment. George is very consistent, whereas Antonelli is not.<\/p>\n

“It’s a good mix of experience and the young. It will benefit them both at the end of the day.<\/p>\n

“George will be aware that Antonelli will improve and has Toto Wolff’s backing, but I think with the right car, George can compete for the championship,” he predicted.<\/p>\n

Ferrari\"07Ferrari had a horrible season in 2025, as they decided to give up on their SF-25 early on to focus on its successor, the SF-26<\/a>.That meant Charles Leclerc<\/a> struggled but managed to deliver some podiums, while newcomer Lewis Hamilton<\/a> endured his worst season in the sport to date with no wins\u2014aside from the China Sprint\u2014and failed to reach the podium.<\/p>\n

Herbert said: “Charles Leclerc has been very impressive with his consistency and control over Ferrari in the last couple of years. He’s shown raw speed and podium positions, but it hasn’t quite worked out yet.<\/p>\n

“The biggest unknown is Lewis Hamilton<\/a>,” the Briton pointed out. “Can he find his mojo? Can he find that something special he used to have? He had that one sprint win last year, but everything else was a struggle for him.<\/p>\n

“I’ve never seen Lewis so emotional before last year. Everything was a struggle, and he was lost, lost for words too. It was awkward to watch; I didn’t enjoy seeing it.<\/p>\n

“I hope his mindset has reset over the winter and that Ferrari can give Lewis and Charles a car to compete with,” Herbert concluded. (Source: JeffBet<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the main talk ahead of the 2026 Formula 1 season is about how the teams will respond…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":418667,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,13275,817,210359,211880,114858,35119,813,816,3875,10115,1737,823,825,2333,85],"class_list":["post-418666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-charles-leclerc","tag-f1","tag-f1-2026","tag-f1-2026-power-unit","tag-f1-2026-regulations","tag-f1-news","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-george-russell","tag-kimi-antonelli","tag-lando-norris","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-max-verstappen","tag-oscar-piastri","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=418666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}