– Former Formula 1 team principal Otmar Szafnauer is convinced that the balance of power at the top of the premier class has shifted in recent months: Until the end of the 2026 season, Ferrari will no longer be Mercedes’ fiercest rival, but world champion McLaren.
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“I still believe that at the end of the season they will be the closest competitor to Mercedes,” Szafnauer said in the High Performance Racing podcast. “I said that from the beginning, but at first it seemed to be Ferrari.”
The Scuderia was closer on the heels of the Silver Arrows in the first races of the year than McLaren and even celebrated two wins in Barcelona and Silverstone. Recently, however, world champion Lando Norris has been the benchmark again with his successes in Budapest and Zandvoort.
“And I think it’s a constant up and down in relative performance because not all upgrades come at the same time and the upgrades are significant,” added the former Aston Martin team principal. “In a year with new rules, you discover a lot, right? So the learning curve is very steep.”
Upgrades still cause major shifts
“When you then introduce this upgrade compared to those who haven’t brought one yet, you take a step forward. And I think we also saw that with Alpine. After Racing Bulls brought their upgrade, they were significantly faster than Alpine.”
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“It looked like they were overtaking them. And now they are roughly on par.” Mercedes also hasn’t brought a major upgrade for a long time, so the balance of power at the top could shift again.
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It remains to be seen whether McLaren can build on recent successes. “Monza will be very important because [McLaren] brought an upgrade that worked in Hungary. As far as I have read, they also continued to use this upgrade in Zandvoort, and now the upgrade is complete. Let’s see how they perform in Monza,” Szafnauer explained.
How effective will the upgrades be at Mercedes?
It will also be crucial when the Silver Arrows bring the next improvements. “They have upgrades now that they could bring, but as soon as you start manufacturing these parts, it costs money, and they would exceed the budget cap,” said the former team principal.
The budget cap is an important topic this year. “What I suspect they will do: one more upgrade, roughly around Malaysia/Singapore,” Szafnauer added. “That doesn’t mean the learning process stops.”
“The learning continues in the background. You keep doing CFD work. You keep working in the wind tunnel. You keep manufacturing wind tunnel parts. All of this is planned. It’s just a question of when you stop and actually bring this upgrade package to the car. And that’s where the money is.”
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“When you actually manufacture car parts, it costs money: new wings, new floors, new body parts,” Szafnauer emphasized. “And I predict they will bring one big upgrade instead of many small ones because they can’t afford it. They are at the budget cap.” That was confirmed by Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff.
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