New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\nWhat is certain, though, is that Hamilton\u2019s victory \u2014 Ferrari\u2019s victory \u2014 has changed the complexion of the campaign. This isn\u2019t the season we thought we had only a few days ago.<\/p>\n
But how much have things changed \u2014 and how much could they keep changing?<\/p>\n
COULD HAMILTON AND FERRARI HAVE WON WITHOUT THE VSC?<\/p>\n
Hamilton\u2019s doubters might be tempted to chalk his breakthrough win down the convenient timing of the virtual safety car, with Fernando Alonso\u2019s stopped Aston Martin providing Hamilton with the cover needed to make his third pit stop without losing the lead.<\/p>\n
But that wasn\u2019t the winning move.<\/p>\n
Ferrari had been the strategically sharper team throughout the race.<\/p>\n
Hamiton starting on softs allowed him to pressure George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli into making a premature first stop, forcing the race onto his terms. When he made his second stop, he unleashed enough pace that ensured Russell couldn\u2019t respond without losing track position.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s true Hamilton would have had to have given up the lead with his final stop without the VSC, but the maths strongly suggests that the Ferrari driver had a good shot at victory regardless.<\/p>\n
He was 17 seconds ahead at the virtual safety car. Had he run to his original final stop, that gap probably would have been around 12.5 seconds, based on how quickly Russell was catching him after the Mercedes driver\u2019s final service.<\/p>\n
At 23 seconds for a pit stop, Hamilton would have rejoined 10.5 seconds behind Russell but with seven lap newer tyres.<\/p>\n
Tyre degradation was worth at least 0.1 seconds per lap, which means he would have caught Russell with nine laps remaining.<\/p>\n
Of course he would have had to have passed Lando Norris and Antonelli before challenging Russell, half a second a lap is usually enough to execute a pass in Spain, and he had that pace in hand.<\/p>\n
At most you could say that we were denied a thrilling chase for the lead, but not that Mercedes was denied a victory.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Lewis would have come through regardless,\u201d Russell said. \u201cLewis had really great pace.\u201d<\/p>\n
‘It’s not over that’s for sure’ | 00:57<\/p>\n
IS HAMILTON BACK TO HIS BEST?<\/p>\n
Hamilton\u2019s victory drought lasted an at-times debilitating 687 days, dating back to his last win with Mercedes at the 2024 Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n
He had to wait 530 days as a Ferrari driver \u2014 31 grands prix \u2014 to stand on the top step of the podium in the famous red overalls.<\/p>\n
Some would use these numbers as a stick to beat him with \u2014 where was he all that time, and doesn\u2019t that mark out this victory as a flash in the pan?<\/p>\n
That would be too superficial a reading, however.<\/p>\n
Hamilton\u2019s trend has clearly been positive, both in his recovery from last year\u2019s nadir and in his building of momentum this season.<\/p>\n
This win, for example, follows successive second-place finishes in Canada and Montreal, where he talked about finally finding his groove.<\/p>\n
These results aren\u2019t random or circumstantial. They\u2019re the fruit of almost 18 months of Hamilton hard work to make himself comfortable at Ferrari.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t a mistake that his new race engineer for this season, Carlo Santi, joined him on the podium to celebrate his victory. Santi is symbolic of Hamilton\u2019s efforts to reshape his side of the garage to get the best out of himself and to influence the direction of the team in a way he knows can bring success.<\/p>\n
Those efforts went all the way to changing his brake discs from 50-year Ferrari partner Brembo to his preferred Carbon Industrie, which he\u2019d used for his entire career before last season.<\/p>\n
It took time, but Ferrari acquiesced to his requests, and now team and driver are reaping the rewards<\/p>\n
For these reasons Hamilton fans should be optimistic that seven-time champion Hamilton really is back in the game.<\/p>\n
Whether he\u2019s back at his absolute best is another question, but while time dulls even the sharpest talents, experience can often account for those lost tenths. Hamilton would perhaps argue that\u2019s exactly what he\u2019s demonstrating this year with his influence.<\/p>\n
‘This one is something else’ | 01:29<\/p>\n
HOW GOOD IS THE FERRARI CAR?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s no coincidence that Ferrari became the first non-Mercedes team to win a grand prix at the weekend it brought another major upgrade to its car.<\/p>\n
The team listed eight new parts ahead of the weekend, which was more than any of its rivals. These lists shouldn\u2019t be treated as definitive \u2014 there\u2019s too much subterfuge for that \u2014 but they are indicative of the size of the package.<\/p>\n
Team principal Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Vasseur has been saying all season that this campaign would be defined by who could achieve the fastest rate of development, not by who started ahead. Of course any team starting behind the curve would say that, but he backed his Maranello factory to prove him right.<\/p>\n
But getting ahead of Mercedes at one race is a different proposition to staying ahead over multiple grands prix.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to see across the course of a couple of races,\u201d Russell cautioned. \u201cThey did bring a big upgrade here. and I think the development slope is so steep at the moment for all of the teams [that] whoever is going to be bringing those upgrades earliest is going to be taking a step forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe saw it with McLaren in Miami, having a really strong weekend, and then ourselves and Ferrari have taken a step forward thereafter.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is regarded as a dependable litmus test of car performance. Even if the baking-hot 52\u00b0C track temperature might have swung the race towards Ferrari\u2019s prodigious tyre-saving downforce \u2014 a possible factor but not the whole story \u2014 a car that\u2019s quick in Barcelona should be competitive at the majority of circuits.<\/p>\n
Norris believed he\u2019d seen enough to be worried about the way the season it going.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re lucky that Ferrari doesn\u2019t have a better engine,\u201d he told Sky Sports. \u201dIf they had a better engine, they\u2019re dominating. They\u2019re the class of the field in terms of cornering performance.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf they make improvements on the engine side, then they\u2019ll embarrass everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Ferrari\u2019s engine may not remain relatively weak for long.<\/p>\n
Reports suggest the FIA is poised to grant Ferrari two in-season upgrades for 2026 and 2027 in light of how far down the curve internal combustion engine is. If these concessions are confirmed, that could give Maranello a crucial opportunity to reduce or perhaps even eliminate its final weakness \u2014 or, in Norris\u2019s words, to embarrass everyone.<\/p>\n
Hamilton overcome after iconic victory | 01:27<\/p>\n
CAN HAMILTON CONTEND FOR HIS EIGHTH CHAMPIONSHIP?<\/p>\n
Hamilton\u2019s deficit shrunk to 41 points thanks to Antonelli\u2019s late retirement. It\u2019s not a small gap \u2014 it\u2019s almost two clear race victories \u2014 but it\u2019s hardly insurmountable.<\/p>\n
Norris came back from 34 points down on Oscar Piastri with nine races remaining last season to win the championship. Verstappen was 104 points down at the same moment and also finished ahead of the Australian.<\/p>\n
Hamilton has 15 grand prix to close the gap.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d rather not fight with him for a title, because I know what he\u2019s capable of,\u201d Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said. \u201cIf he smells blood, he goes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve seen it many years where suddenly the Lewis Hamilton train started to go and then it\u2019s very difficult to stop it.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can see he\u2019s driving strong. The dynamics in the team look to be good between him and his race engineer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw him on the podium on the telly. That face shows me that he\u2019s very happy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking to Sky Sports, Hamilton wasn\u2019t willing to rule out a championship that only two days earlier seemed practically impossible.<\/p>\n
\u201cMercedes have got an amazing package, and they\u2019re so strong,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to take absolutely everything from all of us in this team to overcome the deficit, to get to being ahead of them and doing this consistently.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut nothing\u2019s impossible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hamilton\u2019s move to Ferrari was motivated by many factors. Part of it was reinvention. Part of it was the fulfilment of a childhood dream. But part of it was rolling the dice on winning his lost eighth title.<\/p>\n
The success of the move was always predicated on how he and the team would fare this year, under new regulations. It\u2019s still early days, but the project suddenly looks like it\u2019s going exactly to plan.<\/p>\n
Hamilton claims maiden win at Ferrari! | 02:12<\/p>\n
HOW WILL MERCEDES RESPOND TO THE PRESSURE?<\/p>\n
Verstappen demonstrated last year the sort pressure a multiple world champion on the warpath can bring to bear on a team fielding drivers who have never been in a title battle, forcing mistakes out of McLaren that got him to within two points of what would have been his greatest championship triumph.<\/p>\n
Until now, Mercedes had been focused on managing two competitive drivers a decade on from Hamilton\u2019s rivalry with Nico Rosberg and, more recently, the effect of Antonelli\u2019s success on the internal dynamic.<\/p>\n
Now, however, there\u2019s a new question.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a third party now getting involved in the championship fight, constructor and driver,\u201d Wolff said, per Racer. \u201cIn that respect we will discuss internally with the two drivers how we want to handle the situation where we risk holding each other up.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Mercedes boss was referring to the battle between Russell and Antonelli in their second stint that he thinks cost them a handful of seconds, leaving them vulnerable to Hamilton.<\/p>\n
They were allowed to fight each other because those are the rules at Mercedes \u2014 but they\u2019re the rules because Mercedes hasn\u2019t had to do much fighting with other teams.<\/p>\n
If it can no longer win races by default, it\u2019ll have to start prioritising whichever driver is in the best position to do so from race to race.<\/p>\n
In Barcelona that would have been Antonelli \u2014 and can you imagine the fallout from Russell, on what was supposed to be his recovery weekend, being ordered to give a place over to his teammate and the title leader?<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the sort of pressure McLaren buckled under late last year.<\/p>\n
Mercedes has more time and a large points buffer to spend in making its decision, but it will have to be prepared to make the tough calls eventually.<\/p>\n
Antonelli & Leclerc retire on same lap! | 00:56<\/p>\n
WILL EITHER TEAM PICK A NUMBER ONE DRIVER?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s everyone\u2019s favourite question: will the teams pick their number one drivers if the championship battle really does open up?<\/p>\n
On the one hand, it\u2019s important to note that talk of number one drivers is usually overstated. Teams don\u2019t unilaterally pick one driver to back at the expense of the other just because of a points gap, because it would be counter-productive to do so. Usually teams don\u2019t care who wins so long as its one of their drivers.<\/p>\n
But on the other hand, you know it\u2019s a question that will be rolling around idly in the back of the heads of managers and drivers, particularly if the mathematics begin to demand it.<\/p>\n
As an example, imagine if Russell had been a better match for Antonelli this year and they had three grand prix wins apiece. Suddenly neither would have a meaningful buffer to Hamilton behind them. A Russell resurgence could now be seen as a hindrance to Antonelli rebuilding his points buffer ahead of Hamilton.<\/p>\n
With Russell yet to show he\u2019s anything more than only sometimes Antonelli\u2019s equal in the last six rounds, there\u2019d be some temptation to back the Italian\u2019s title campaign if Hamilton keeps closing the gap, particularly with Russell still 50 points adrift.<\/p>\n
Ferrari, likewise, must see some logic to turbocharging the score of the driver closest to the front. A 41-point gap is still significant, and Hamilton likely can\u2019t afford to lose many points to Charles Leclerc if he wants to close it \u2014 and Leclerc is already a chunky 40 points adrift.<\/p>\n
Yet it would be premature for Mercedes or Ferrari to suddenly throw its weight behind only one of its drivers.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re only seven rounds into the season \u2014 less than a third of the way through \u2014 and there\u2019s still much uncertainty on how the year will pan out.<\/p>\n
Russell on paper should have the capacity to fight his way back into the mix \u2014 and Antonelli\u2019s sudden engine failure demonstrated how quickly things could swing back towards the Briton.<\/p>\n
As for Leclerc, his surprisingly large 40-point deficit is thanks to two successive failures to score, in Monte Carlo and Barcelona, for which he shoulders limited blame, with brakes and power steering the respective culprits. He was leading Hamilton on the title table beforehand.<\/p>\n
If the title battle is to come down to each team choosing its preferred candidate, that decision will still be several months away.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s just one of several fascinating questions asked by Hamilton\u2019s famous Ferrari first in Spain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lewis Hamilton\u2019s breakthrough Ferrari win was the Briton\u2019s long-awaited response to the critics who claimed his Maranello move…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":739151,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-739150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739150","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=739150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/739151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/poster-fallback.png\"\/)
<\/p>\n