Will Ferrari lead the Australian Grand Prix out of Turn 1?
Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton looks on in a press conference in Bahrain
Will the Ferraris of Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc lead out of Turn 1 at this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix?
The pair’s lightning practice starts in Bahrain testing suggest Leclerc and Hamilton could be difficult to contain off the line in Melbourne…
Ferrari start advantage could pay dividends for Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc
A version of this article originally appeared in PlanetF1.com’s conclusions from Bahrain testing
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It is said that Ferrari was a dissenting voice in talks last year for a change to the race start procedure for 2026.
Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc’s practice starts in Bahrain showed why the team had been keen to keep things as they were in previous years.
With the highly complex MGU-H – the ancillary used to convert thermal energy into electricity and manage the speed of the turbo – removed from the engine architecture this season, turbo lag has re-emerged as an issue (yep, another one) with the 2026 cars.
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A prolonged start procedure, featuring a five-second warning period between the last car lining up on the grid and the start of the lights signal, was trialled during testing in Bahrain after teams expressed safety concerns ahead of the Australian Grand Prix.
It quickly became evident that Ferrari’s starts are by some distance the most potent on the grid even with its rivals getting more time to prepare for lights out.
It is said that Ferrari’s smaller turbo, responsible for its punchy acceleration out of slower corners and its success at street circuits under the previous rule set, is the secret weapon behind the team’s impressive start-line performance.
Not since the first year of the old KERS system in 2009, when the starting grid was split between the haves and have-nots, has there been such a performance disparity among the cars off the line.
The SF-26’s standard-setting starts came as an added bonus in what was a highly encouraging pre-season for Ferrari, which should go some way to easing the tensions that developed over the course of 2025.
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The famous blame culture risked raising its head at points last year as Ferrari suffered its third winless season of the decade, John Elkann called for the drivers to “talk less” and Fred Vasseur faced weekly questions over his future even after signing a new multi-year contract.
This, to all intents and purposes, was a team spiralling out of control in slow motion.
In that sense, perhaps the most uplifting aspect of Ferrari’s winter came in the final week in Bahrain with the arrival of two highly innovative upgrades: an exhaust-mounted wing and a rotating active aero rear wing.
As noted by PlanetF1.com tech editor Matt Somerfield, it remains to be seen whether the new rear wing in particular will bring any significant advantage.
Or whether it will even be an upgrade on the more conventional DRS-style rear wings, which, for one thing, open and close more quickly than Ferrari’s version.
Yet the fact these parts have been developed at all is the surest sign that Ferrari’s willingness to take risks and think creatively – both pillars of Vasseur’s philosophy since his appointment more than three years ago – remains unbruised by the experience of 2025.
That kind of technical courage, in an environment in which mistakes have historically been heavily punished, deserves to be rewarded.
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