“A race of upgrades” – How development will decide the 2026 F1 title

The 2026 Formula 1 season is shaping up how it was expected to be, with the development race deciding the pecking order as the campaign progresses. Although Mercedes started this regulation cycle in dominant form, winning the opening six grands prix from pole, it has ‘only’ won two of the last five with Ferrari and McLaren entering the fray.

Ferrari, in particular, has made headlines thanks to the raft of upgrades it brought in early 2026, drawing questions from Mercedes boss Toto Wolff about how this was possible under the cost cap.

The Scuderia nevertheless took much-needed wins in Barcelona and Silverstone, while last weekend in Hungary Lando Norris won by 15s from pole after his McLaren team updated five components on its MCL40: a modified rear wing endplate, new floor and floor board, revised front and rear corner furniture, plus an enlarged brake cooling outlet. 

It was staggering how much the Woking outfit’s pace transcended at the Hungaroring – where it claimed a third consecutive victory and could have finished 1-2 had Oscar Piastri not retired with a gearbox fault late on – with its improved aerodynamic package working a treat at the tight and twisty circuit. To go from no man’s land in third to being in the mix amongst the top two showed how valuable an efficient development plan is this year, considering the freshness of the ruleset.

This is the biggest regulation overhaul in recent F1 history and just 11 rounds into the era, teams are still trying to learn their cars and understand which direction to take them. So, McLaren boss Andrea Stella expects this fight to continue and reckons it’ll decide who is the quickest come the season finale – currently scheduled to be Abu Dhabi on 4-6 December, but the ongoing Middle Eastern conflict puts that in doubt.

Stella said: “The improvement from a competitiveness point of view can be entirely ascribed to the upgrades that we took here. But at the same time, we were sort of thinking that this lap time step [would] not necessarily have been enough to be in pole position at the Hungaroring.

“Definitely we would not [have] thought that there would be enough to have such a strong pace in the race. Honestly, I still believe that if we want to be in a position to fight for victories consistently in the future, we need to keep our focus on delivering more upgrades.

Oscar Piastri, McLaren, Andrea Stella, McLaren, Lando Norris, McLaren

Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images

“That is the plan, but we are not naive. We know that this will be the plan for all the teams. So I think like it’s always been in this 2026 season, it’s a matter of a race of upgrades. The good news is that McLaren is now back in this race of upgrades while fighting for the lead.

“But I expect that the car that will be the best car at the end of the season will keep adding tenths of a second in the next 11 [12 currently scheduled] races, probably as much as half a second. So, definitely a lot of work ahead of everyone, not only McLaren.”

Stella’s team knows better than any of the current crop how important upgrades can be.

Taking the last regulation cycle, for example, ground effect from 2022 to 2025, McLaren started it as a firm midfielder but then upgrades in 2023 eventually led to the team overtaking the previously dominant Red Bull to win the 2024 and 2025 titles.

As such, the Woking outfit has no plans to slow down and factored this into the budget cap, knowing “2026 would have been not much about the starting point, but more about the race to upgrade”. It is therefore expected to bring further updates at the next race in Zandvoort on 21-23 August, before finally fitting its Ferrari-style ‘Macarena Wing’ for the low-downforce Monza two weeks later.

But Stella is reluctant to confirm whether this’ll result in McLaren fighting Mercedes and the Scuderia consistently, because while the reigning champions might fit upgrades efficiently, so are the other teams – highlighted by Ferrari’s victories in 2026.

“There will be a few things coming for the next races,” said Stella. “This year, pretty much the top teams have always been successful in introducing upgrades to what I can see. I think this is because the rules are still relatively immature and the opportunities in terms of developing the car are almost low hanging fruit to cash in.

“So I don’t think McLaren has any particular advantage in like, ‘oh everything we take is successful’. I think everyone is now doing a good job in terms of bringing successful upgrades. It will be more about how many upgrades the top teams will be in condition to deliver so far and for what’s left of the season, because we are only midway in this season.”

Additional reporting by Stuart Codling and Ronald Vording

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– The Motorsport.com Team