2026 Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix - Barcelona, June 12 - 14

[mzso]

FFS. Hamilton always with the ridiculous luck. And Leclerc always the opposite. As soon as he does his pit stop there's a VSC and then a technical failure for good measure.

Hamilton got lucky and Leclerc got unlucky. But frankly it wasn’t like Hamilton needed the luck. His pace was out of this world and he won by a landslide. He would’ve won with or without the VSC, it just robbed us of his fight back to the lead.

he won by an entire pit stop. He would’ve caught up with 10 or so laps remaining and would’ve had no problem passing Russell and Antonelli, since he had a massive pace delta.

Behind the two Mercedeses, and maybe Norris, would have been a very different battle. Very much doubtful.
He was that quick because of clean air.

[jurinius]

FFS. Hamilton always with the ridiculous luck. And Leclerc always the opposite. As soon as he does his pit stop there's a VSC and then a technical failure for good measure.

Ferrari had an aggressive strategy for the first time since years !!! pitting first, taking risks. Luigi made that happens. You push your team to excellence, That's the definition of greatness LH44

[FrukostScones]

FFS. Hamilton always with the ridiculous luck. And Leclerc always the opposite. As soon as he does his pit stop there's a VSC and then a technical failure for good measure.

Hamilton got lucky and Leclerc got unlucky. But frankly it wasn’t like Hamilton needed the luck. His pace was out of this world and he won by a landslide. He would’ve won with or without the VSC, it just robbed us of his fight back to the lead.

Behind the two Mercedeses, and maybe Norris, would have been a very different battle. Very much doubtful.

Merc murdered their tyres today. HAM was untouchable today.

[mzso]

Hamilton got lucky and Leclerc got unlucky. But frankly it wasn’t like Hamilton needed the luck. His pace was out of this world and he won by a landslide. He would’ve won with or without the VSC, it just robbed us of his fight back to the lead.

Behind the two Mercedeses, and maybe Norris, would have been a very different battle. Very much doubtful.

Merc murdered their tyres today. HAM was untouchable today.

Did you watch some fantasy version of the race? He only got in front because of the VSC.

[FrukostScones]

Behind the two Mercedeses, and maybe Norris, would have been a very different battle. Very much doubtful.

Merc murdered their tyres today. HAM was untouchable today.

Did you watch some fantasy version of the race? He only got in front because of the VSC.

How do you know?

[mkay]

Behind the two Mercedeses, and maybe Norris, would have been a very different battle. Very much doubtful.

Merc murdered their tyres today. HAM was untouchable today.

Did you watch some fantasy version of the race? He only got in front because of the VSC.

HAM was a in a good shout to win the race regardless of the VSC. He had c. 15 second gap on L41 (pre-VSC) and was going to put hards at around L46, and would have come out between 5-8s behind ANT-RUS. Definitely a workable gap over 20 laps, and 10 laps fresher tyres, considering the gap HAM pulled on ANT-RUS post-VSC.

[Badger]

Palmer was saying the same thing as Brundle but TBH I think it's just the commentators trying to be positive as Lewis wins for the first time in red. Obviously if he had come out 15 seconds behind the leaders whilst having to pass 3 quick cars that would have made it almost impossible. The VSC couldn't have come at a better time for him to inherit the lead with a tyre advantage to the end. Still, the pace was real and the Merc looked vulnerable the entire race, both from Lewis and Lando.

Did we watch different races? Hamilton won by 20 seconds (I think he also slowed down a bit in celebration on lap 66), so he won by an entire pit stop. He would’ve caught up with 10 or so laps remaining and would’ve had no problem passing Russell and Antonelli, since he had a massive pace delta.

And all 20 of those seconds can be accounted for by the VSC pit stop and driving in completely clean air on fresh rubber whilst the others were battling behind. Put Hamilton 15 seconds at the back of that pack and it's a different scenario, having to pass 3 quick Merc engined cars. The best of the tyres would have been spent catching up, then there's the slog of dirty air and sliding x3. I don't see him winning in that scenario, he gets stuck behind Antonelli.

[mkay]

Palmer was saying the same thing as Brundle but TBH I think it's just the commentators trying to be positive as Lewis wins for the first time in red. Obviously if he had come out 15 seconds behind the leaders whilst having to pass 3 quick cars that would have made it almost impossible. The VSC couldn't have come at a better time for him to inherit the lead with a tyre advantage to the end. Still, the pace was real and the Merc looked vulnerable the entire race, both from Lewis and Lando.

Did we watch different races? Hamilton won by 20 seconds (I think he also slowed down a bit in celebration on lap 66), so he won by an entire pit stop. He would’ve caught up with 10 or so laps remaining and would’ve had no problem passing Russell and Antonelli, since he had a massive pace delta.

And all 20 of those seconds can be accounted for by the VSC pit stop and driving in completely clean air on fresh rubber whilst the others were battling behind. Put Hamilton 15 seconds at the back of that pack and it's a different scenario, having to pass 3 quick Merc engined cars. The best of the tyres would have been spent catching up, then there's the slog of dirty air and sliding x3. I don't see him winning in that scenario, he gets stuck behind Antonelli.

That is flat out wrong. HAM had nearly 15 second gap to RUS-ANT pre-VSC which is how he had the VSC gap to pit. Assuming HAM loses 5-8 seconds to RUS-ANT until his eventual third pit stop, he would have come out 8-10 seconds behind them, with 20 laps to go and 12-13 lap fresher tyres.

[PlatinumZealot]

Today was a good day.

[Badger]

Did we watch different races? Hamilton won by 20 seconds (I think he also slowed down a bit in celebration on lap 66), so he won by an entire pit stop. He would’ve caught up with 10 or so laps remaining and would’ve had no problem passing Russell and Antonelli, since he had a massive pace delta.

And all 20 of those seconds can be accounted for by the VSC pit stop and driving in completely clean air on fresh rubber whilst the others were battling behind. Put Hamilton 15 seconds at the back of that pack and it's a different scenario, having to pass 3 quick Merc engined cars. The best of the tyres would have been spent catching up, then there's the slog of dirty air and sliding x3. I don't see him winning in that scenario, he gets stuck behind Antonelli.

That is flat out wrong. HAM had nearly 15 second gap to RUS-ANT pre-VSC which is how he had the VSC gap to pit. Assuming HAM loses 5-8 seconds to RUS-ANT until his eventual third pit stop, he would have come out 8-10 seconds behind them, with 20 laps to go and 12-13 lap fresher tyres.

A pit stop loses around 23s of track time in Spain. He was 15 seconds ahead when the VSC came out, 6-7 more laps would have put him around 15 seconds behind Russell assuming a 1s per lap loss on older tyres. So I am right in saying 15s, your estimate of 5-8s is what is flat out wrong.

Catching 15s and passing 3 Mercs would have been hard. To say he definitely would have won regardless is too cavalier and underestimates the difficulty of passing 3 quick cars in dirty air.

[search]

Catching 15s and passing 3 Mercs would have been hard. To say he definitely would have won regardless is too cavalier and underestimates the difficulty of passing 3 quick cars in dirty air.

we will never know for sure, but Russell was in in the 1:22's with 10 laps to go already, compared to 1:20 flat at the beginning of Hamilton's final stint. A shorter stint would have allowed for even better speed, so likely >2s faster after the pit stop.

Passing is a different story, of course, but I think he had a good shot - against Russell at least. Mercedes swapping positions would have made it more difficult. But they didn't look willing to.

[Luscion]

Russell said in a post race interview that it didnt matter if Lewis got the VSC or not, said with the pace lewis had he would have still passed them again anyways. Also even after Kimi got past Russell, Lewis was still around 3-5 tenths faster

[Badger]

Catching 15s and passing 3 Mercs would have been hard. To say he definitely would have won regardless is too cavalier and underestimates the difficulty of passing 3 quick cars in dirty air.

we will never know for sure, but Russell was in in the 1:22's with 10 laps to go already, compared to 1:20 flat at the beginning of Hamilton's final stint. A shorter stint would have allowed for even better speed, so likely >2s faster after the pit stop.

Passing is a different story, of course, but I think he had a good shot - against Russell at least. Mercedes swapping positions would have made it more difficult. But they didn't look willing to.

It's not Russell that would have been the problem, it's Kimi. Either Kimi is stuck behind Russell inside the overtake which would have made him really hard to overtake for a Ferrari, or alternatively he gets past Russell (like he did) and he would have been hard to catch and overtake with his pace.

[mkay]

And all 20 of those seconds can be accounted for by the VSC pit stop and driving in completely clean air on fresh rubber whilst the others were battling behind. Put Hamilton 15 seconds at the back of that pack and it's a different scenario, having to pass 3 quick Merc engined cars. The best of the tyres would have been spent catching up, then there's the slog of dirty air and sliding x3. I don't see him winning in that scenario, he gets stuck behind Antonelli.

That is flat out wrong. HAM had nearly 15 second gap to RUS-ANT pre-VSC which is how he had the VSC gap to pit. Assuming HAM loses 5-8 seconds to RUS-ANT until his eventual third pit stop, he would have come out 8-10 seconds behind them, with 20 laps to go and 12-13 lap fresher tyres.

A pit stop loses around 23s of track time in Spain. He was 15 seconds ahead when the VSC came out, 6-7 more laps would have put him around 15 seconds behind Russell assuming a 1s per lap loss on older tyres. So I am right in saying 15s, your estimate of 5-8s is what is flat out wrong.

Catching 15s and passing 3 Mercs would have been hard. To say he definitely would have won regardless is too cavalier and underestimates the difficulty of passing 3 quick cars in dirty air.

HAM-RUS gap would have dropped to ~9-10s until they would have pitted him, so he would have come back 12-13s at most, with 20 laps left and 13-lap fresher tyres. HAM would have been able to pound 1:20s for most of the stint, while RUS and ANT were already doing high 21s, mid-22s by lap 50.

HAM's stint on mediums arguably put in a great shout for the race win, VSC or not.