2026 British Grand Prix Race Review

Linus O'Howell
1 day ago
4 min read

Leclerc Returns to Winning Ways as Championship Chaos Continues

For the first time since Austin 2024, Charles Leclerc was able to stand on the top step of the Podium as the latest winner of the British Grand Prix! Despite suffering a slow puncture during the Race, George Russell was able to recover to a second-place finish, whilst Lewis Hamilton rounded out the Podium after Ferrari gave up a 1-2 during the final Safety Car!

The Biggest Talking Points

In a similar way to early on in the season, Andrea Kimi Antonelli failed to get off the line well, with both Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton moving past him into Turn 1! Oscar Piastri didn’t get a good start at all, picking up damage as he completely dropped to the back of the pack, with the Aussie not even able to recover to score a single point! There was also one other thing to note on the opening lap, and that was that Alex Albon wiped out Oliver Bearman, with the Williams driver receiving a 10-second time penalty! Surprisingly, it took Kimi Antonelli a while to pass Lewis Hamilton for P2, with Charles Leclerc actually managing to pull out quite a nice gap (of around 4 seconds) out front! Red Bull clearly decided that they needed to do something different, with both Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar pitting early to commit to a two-stop strategy, whilst matters would then get worse for Hamilton as he received a 5-second time penalty for a false start! That penalty would eventually see Lewis drop behind both Max and George Russell after the first round of pit stops, with this leading to the best battle of the Race between the three of them! Sadly, the battle would come to a premature end, with Russell having to box for a slow puncture! More bad luck for the Brit (or so we thought)!

When the Audi of Nico Hulkenberg decided to give up, a Virtual Safety Car was called, with both Max Verstappen and Lando Norris (who we haven’t even talked about yet) deciding to box for a new set of tyres! When we got back going properly, Andrea Kimi Antonelli was quickly catching Charles Leclerc for the win in what seemed to be a bit of an unfair fight! However, more issues for Mercedes struck, with a piece of the brake duct getting stuck on the left-hand side of Kimi’s car, resulting in the Championship leader dropping all the way down the order as he had to pit multiple times for repairs! Whilst Antonelli would find some good pace again, he also received a 5-second time penalty for his multiple off-track excursions, leading to him eventually dropping out of the points entirely due to the late-Race Safety Car! Why was there a Safety Car, you ask? Well, that’s because Max Verstappen went spinning off into the gravel at Stowe corner, with the Dutchman crashing out from a Podium position! It was confirmed by both Max and Red Bull that it was another car issue like they had in Qualifying at Austria last weekend, something that simply isn’t good enough or acceptable! Amazingly, Ferrari decided to pit both of their drivers, with Lewis Hamilton losing a place to George Russell, a position he wasn’t able to reclaim as the Grand Prix finished behind the Safety Car! That in itself was a complete and utter mess, with the FIA going back on its original decision to give us a 1-Lap Shootout!

The Standout Drives in the Race

I’ve given out two 10’s for the 2026 British Grand Prix, and the first one is obviously for Charles Leclerc! It feels like it’s been quite a while since I gave Charles a 10; it’s been a very difficult period for him, but he drove superbly well today, with his first stint in particular meaning he deserved to win today, albeit with a slight bit of fortune! The other driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Liam Lawson, and I’ll tell you what, this guy might have a higher average rating in my Midseason Driver Article than Isack Hadjar had at Racing Bulls last year! Liam is driving absolutely incredibly right now, and I haven’t brought up the fact that he finished P6! Speaking of VCARB, Arvid Lindblad came home one place lower in P7, earning his team another 14 points, whilst Gabriel Bortoleto was finally able to score strong points for Audi with a P8 finish! Also, Alpine scored double points, with Franco Colapinto beating Pierre Gasly (who actually got quite unlucky with a terrible pit stop), whilst I felt like both Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Max Verstappen put in very strong performances today, only for it to all go wrong at the end!

Drivers Who Had a Shocker

Amazingly, I have given out a 1 for today’s Race, and that is unfortunately for Alex Albon! Alex wiped out Oliver Bearman at the start, completely ruining both of their Races, with Alex picking up a ton of damage as well as a 10-second time penalty! This meant that Albon wasn’t able to make any sort of progress back through the field, with him eventually retiring early! What a poor season it’s been for both Albon and Williams! Elsewhere, I wasn’t particularly impressed when I realised that Esteban Ocon still managed to end up as the second Haas driver, despite the fact that his teammate got wiped out on the opening lap, whilst I quickly want to mention how both Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton fumbled a second-place finish today, something that could come back to bite them! Oh, and Red Bull are risking losing Max Verstappen with all of their recent issues!