Formula 1 Mid-Season Review

The 2026 Formula 1 Championship has given us a season of breakthrough performances and results we wouldn’t expect. With the first half of the season completed, the fight for the trophy is far from over. 

(Image credit to @f1 on Instagram)

The 2026 season so far has given us 11 grand prix weekends including 4 sprint races in China, Miami, Canada and Great Britain. Within these races we have seen powerful performances from teams with new championship leaders and a few surprises.

Championship Review:

The start of the season set off down under in Melbourne, Australia and it was Mercedes driver, George Russell who took the first pole position and grand prix victory taking the lead of the Driver’s Championship for the first time ever. Along with that, we saw the debut of 11th team, Cadillac, with veteran drivers Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas making their return since their exit after the 2024 season. 

Also making his debut was 18 year old Arvid Lindblad with Visa Cash App Racing Bulls after joining their junior team in 2021. All through this first half he has shown incredible pace earning 23 points in the championship. 

Moving on to Round 3 in Japan, we saw ourselves with a new championship leader, Kimi Antonelli, who became the youngest championship leader at just 19 years old. 

Shifting forward to the last race before summer break in Hungary, Antonelli still leads the championship just 50 points ahead of 7 time world champion Lewis Hamilton. We also have our reigning world champion Lando Norris down in fifth place behind George Russell in third with 160 points and Charles Leclerc in fourth with 138 points. 

Looking at the midfield, we have a fight between the Racing Bulls and Alpine for P5 in the championship with Racing Bulls coming out ahead by just 5 points. And at the bottom of the constructors, we have Cadillac who are yet to score a point and Aston Martin who only have one point after inheriting P10 in Monaco after Sergio Perez gained a post-race penalty.

Biggest Talking Points:

Throughout this year there have been a plethora of things that have made stories throughout the Formula 1 world. One of these stories being the impressive performances that rookie Arvid Lindblad has shown everyone. With being just 18 years old, he has had consistent Q3 appearances and points finishes. His highest qualifying position was P8 in Belgium at the Spa-Francorchamps and his highest race result being P7 in Monaco and his home race at Silverstone in Great Britain. 

On the other hand, Aston Martin has been talked about but not in the way they had originally thought. In September 2024, it was announced that Adrian Newey would be working with the team after being with Red Bull Racing for almost 19 years. Signing Adrian to work with the team was meant to be a monumental move coming into 2026 as he is known for building championship winning cars. However, this year with the new rules and regulations, the Aston Martin hasn’t been showing the best performances with both Alonso and Stroll only managing to qualify P21 and P22 four grand prix in a row from Barcelona to Spa. However, coming into Budapest, the team gave the cars 16 new upgrades in hopes to be in the fight for points. The upgrades had shown to work as Alonso gave the team their first Q2 appearance this year by qualifying in P16. 

Another big talking point that has been dragged on through this year is a seat move for Max Verstappen to McLaren. These rumours stemmed from an announcement on the 9th of April that Max’s race engineer GianPiero Lambiase would be joining the papaya team no later than 2028. The rumours also extended to that if Max were to leave Red Bull, it would be Oscar Piastri who would be replaced but this was instantly shut down earlier when Oscar said “I’m happy where I am” after being asked if he is thinking of leaving McLaren. 

2026 Statistics: 

This year saw Mercedes dominating the first group of races, however coming up towards the Barcelona - Catalunya grand prix, their form started to shake. It was this race where we saw Mercedes face reliability issues with championship leader Kimi Antonelli having a DNF due to a suspected engine failure. This gave Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton his first grand prix victory with the team. These issues also came into play 2 races later at the British Grand Prix where another potential win was given to the Mercedes championship rival, Ferrari. 

If we have a look at the overall winners of each grand prix, Mercedes have been consistently dominant with them claiming 10 poles out of the 11 grand prix this season with Kimi Antonelli having 6 pole positions and George Russell having 4. It was current world champion Lando Norris who broke this streak by taking pole at the Hungarian Grand Prix with a 1:17.207. 

Moving on to the team head-to-head statistics, there have been some close teammate results, and some which are very clear on who is the more dominant driver within the team. Looking at the qualifying head-to-heads, the biggest gaps between teammates is Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar where Max has out-qualified Isack in 7 grand prix weekends. This is the same with Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto with the younger of the two only out-qualifying his teammate twice. Switching to the closer results, it is the Alpine and VCARB drivers who have the closest results with Franco Colapinto and Liam Lawson beating their teammates Pierre Gasly and Arvid Lindblad six times. 

What’s Next?

The Formula 1 summer break ends at the end of August when Zandvoort resumes the season from the 21st to the 23rd. However, the championship is far from decided as we head into the last remaining 12 races of the season. We have tracks that offer many different challenges. From the low downforce setup of Monza, to the high altitudes of Mexico City and brand new tracks like the Madring and the Sepang circuit making a return. 

Looking back earlier this year in April, the FIA had decided to cancel the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian Grand Prix because of conflict within the Middle Eastern region. And it was on the weekend of the Hungary Grand Prix where it was announced that the Bahrain race would be rescheduled on the weekend between Azerbaijan and Singapore. But the twist is that it would be held in Malaysia at the Sepang Circuit which hasn’t been in Formula 1 since 2017 where we saw Max Verstappen take a victory. 

So with that, who do you think will be the world champion of the 2026 Formula 1 season?

Article Written by Sophie Wong