Ferrari’s Zandvoort upgrades delivered genuine pace, but Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc experienced two wildly different versions of the SF-26. One new floor produced two contrasting verdicts.
Leclerc found a car he could attack with immediately. Hamilton found one that snapped away when he leaned hardest on the rear tyres. Their roles then reversed on Saturday, when Hamilton recovered his confidence, and Leclerc began fighting unexpected power delivery.
The split carried serious stakes. Ferrari began the second half of the season chasing Mercedes, while Hamilton entered Zandvoort only 50 points behind championship leader Kimi Antonelli. A major floor package offered another chance to close that gap.
Instead, the weekend became a live stress test of the SF-26’s drivability. The new aerodynamic package raised the car’s performance ceiling, but reaching it still demanded precise setup, clean tyre preparation, and predictable power delivery. That combination proved painfully difficult to hold.
Ferrari targets a wider aerodynamic window
Ferrari reworked almost every important section beneath the car. The package featured a revised floor body, floor board, floor edge, diffuser geometry, and lower beam wing. Together, those parts form one aerodynamic system.
The floor accelerates air beneath the car, while the diffuser manages how that flow expands at the rear. If the airflow breaks down, the driver can lose grip suddenly rather than progressively. Ferrari’s engineers wanted more downforce across a wider range of conditions, plus stronger airflow toward the diffuser.
Leclerc had already explained the thinking on Thursday. Ferrari, he said, had a “very clear” development program and a much stronger correlation between its simulations and the track than under previous regulations.
That matters at Zandvoort. Drivers brake hard for Tarzan at Turn 1, load the car through the banked Hugenholtz corner, and commit through the high-speed sweep of Scheivlak at Turn 8. Wind, tyre temperature, or a small ride-height change can alter the balance within seconds.
The revised underfloor aimed to make the SF-26 less vulnerable to those shifts. The weekend showed that Ferrari achieved part of that goal, but not all of it.
Ferrari delays the new floor’s track debut
Ferrari did not use the new floor during the sole practice session. Both drivers completed FP1 with the previous specification before the updated package arrived for Sprint Qualifying.
Ferrari ambassador Marc Gené confirmed during broadcast coverage that the team planned to fit the new floors after practice. That decision left Hamilton and Leclerc without a conventional back-to-back test during the session.
Even so, the older car looked competitive. Antonelli led FP1 with a 1:12.949, while Hamilton finished fourth, only 0.190 seconds behind. Leclerc followed in fifth after several untidy moments during his final soft-tyre attempt.
Hamilton liked the balance. The rear felt predictable, and the car gave him enough confidence to attack Zandvoort’s banking. Then Ferrari installed the new floor.
Leclerc immediately unlocks the upgrade
The first competitive run for Ferrari’s Zandvoort upgrades produced a striking result for Leclerc. He reached SQ3 and delivered a 1:11.622, placing him third for the Sprint.
George Russell claimed pole with a 1:11.567, which left Leclerc only 0.055 seconds short. Those numbers came from their final SQ3 laps, rather than the Sprint race itself.
Leclerc called it his best qualifying lap of the season. Watching from the outside, the reason looked clear. He attacked the banking without making a second steering correction and carried speed through the circuit’s narrow middle sector.
The new floor appeared to give him a rear end he could trust. More importantly, Leclerc could feel the grip arriving before he committed.
“I think it’s my best qualifying lap this year,” he said afterward. “That means we are doing something right with the feeling.”
Ferrari had bolted on a largely untested floor and immediately placed one car within half a tenth of pole. That represented a serious technical win, but Hamilton faced a different reality across the garage.
Hamilton loses trust in the rear
Hamilton recorded a 1:12.191 in SQ3. That placed him seventh, exactly 0.624 seconds behind Russell’s pole time and 0.569 seconds behind Leclerc. His pace had disappeared.
Ferrari made what Hamilton described as “subtle adjustments” alongside the floor change after FP1. Once Sprint Qualifying began, the rear started breaking away without warning.
Hamilton lost trust in the car right when he needed it most: braking into Tarzan and loading the tyres through Zandvoort’s high-speed banking. “It was a completely different car,” he said. “We need to figure out what went wrong.”
Ferrari has not disclosed whether those adjustments involved front-wing angle, ride height, damping, or anti-roll-bar settings. Assigning the swing to one specific mechanical change would therefore amount to guesswork.
Hamilton later made one point clear. He did not blame the new floor itself. Instead, he believed the combination of setup changes had pushed the SF-26 outside its working window. That distinction shaped the rest of Ferrari’s weekend.
The Sprint proves Ferrari’s race pace
Saturday’s 24-lap Sprint gave the team a more revealing test. Leclerc started third on soft tyres, while the leading Mercedes and McLaren drivers selected mediums. Only Haas driver Ollie Bearman joined him on the C4 compound.
The gamble looked dangerous because Zandvoort punishes the rear tyres through its banked corners. Leclerc needed the softs to survive far longer than a conventional qualifying run. They held on.
Leclerc stayed close to Lando Norris, whose McLaren began losing rear grip as the laps passed. The Ferrari driver also noticed that Norris lacked electrical deployment along the main straight.
On Lap 18, Leclerc tucked into the McLaren’s slipstream and moved inside under braking for Tarzan at Turn 1. Norris ran wide, while Leclerc held the tighter line and took second.
The move supplied the clearest visual evidence yet that Ferrari’s latest floor package had improved the car. Leclerc could follow another machine, protect his tyres, and still attack late on the softer compound.
Russell won the Sprint, with Leclerc finishing 1.360 seconds behind. Norris completed the top three, while Hamilton remained trapped in seventh.
Hamilton’s balance problem had carried into the race, and Zandvoort offered few realistic passing opportunities between similarly paced cars. Ferrari now had enough evidence to act.
Ferrari rebuilds Hamilton’s confidence
Teams could change their setups again after the Sprint. Ferrari used that window aggressively on Hamilton’s side of the garage, while Leclerc required only minor adjustments.
The team has not released Hamilton’s complete setup sheet, but his performance revealed the scale of the turnaround. He struggled initially at Tarzan and damaged two sets of soft tyres with lockups during Q1. As the session progressed, however, the rear stopped surprising him, and each lap looked cleaner.
By Q3, Hamilton produced a 1:11.494 and qualified fifth. Leclerc followed in sixth with a 1:11.558.
Lando Norris took pole with a 1:11.163. Hamilton finished 0.331 seconds behind, while Leclerc trailed by 0.395 seconds.
The comparison between Friday and Saturday proved revealing. Hamilton improved by 0.697 seconds from his SQ3 lap, while Leclerc gained only 0.064 seconds.
Track evolution, temperatures, and tyre conditions prevent a perfect comparison. Still, the direction looked obvious. Hamilton’s Friday problem came from a setup that did not suit the new floor, rather than a fundamental failure in the upgrade.
“I’m so much happier with the car,” Hamilton said after qualifying. “The difference it makes in the car is unbelievable.”
Hamilton’s turnaround gave Ferrari its clearest answer. The Zandvoort floor worked, but only inside a narrow setup window.
Leclerc’s power delivery turns unpredictable
While Hamilton recovered, Leclerc encountered a new issue. Ferrari changed its power-unit strategy as qualifying progressed, and the SF-26 began cutting power at unexpected points before accelerating suddenly elsewhere.
That behavior disrupted Leclerc’s rhythm. A driver preparing to balance the car with the throttle cannot tolerate an unexpected reduction or surge in torque.
“We changed some things during qualifying,” Leclerc explained. “In Q3, I didn’t expect the engine to cut at certain points or accelerate suddenly at others.”
The problem also complicated Ferrari’s assessment of the new floor. Leclerc did not believe the car had pole position pace, but he felt Ferrari could have extracted more than sixth.
Tyre preparation added another layer. As the track temperature fell from roughly 33.5 degrees Celsius in Q2 to 30.5 degrees in Q3, Ferrari sent both drivers through two preparation laps. Mercedes and McLaren banked times sooner.
Ferrari’s approach helped warm the soft tyres, but it also left Hamilton and Leclerc exposed as light rain approached and the circuit continued changing. Those decisions cost time that Ferrari could not recover.
The telemetry exposes Ferrari’s remaining weakness
Public telemetry painted a more complete picture of the upgraded SF-26. Between Turns 13 and 14, Hamilton reached approximately 302 km/h, while Norris and Antonelli approached 308 km/h through the same section.
Ferrari remained near 303 km/h on the final straight. The Mercedes-powered cars reached roughly 310 km/h. Battery charge and engine mapping remain hidden, so those figures cannot isolate one cause.
The broader pattern still stood out. Ferrari gained time through Zandvoort’s slower and more technical corners, with Hamilton recovering almost 0.196 seconds on Antonelli in those sections. Once speeds climbed, Mercedes and McLaren pulled away again.
That evidence supported the drivers’ positive comments about the floor. Ferrari’s Zandvoort upgrades improved load, rotation, and cornering performance. They did not erase Ferrari’s straight-line and energy-deployment deficit.
Leclerc’s strange power delivery made that weakness harder to manage. Hamilton’s restored balance made the aerodynamic gain easier to see. The two drivers had reached the same conclusion from opposite directions: Ferrari had built a faster car, but not yet an easier one.
The Grand Prix will deliver the final verdict
Antonelli leads the championship with 224 points. Hamilton sits second on 171, with Russell only three points further back. Ferrari cannot afford another weekend where one driver finds the car, and the other spends half the event trying to understand it.
Sunday’s 72-lap Dutch Grand Prix will place the new floor under heavier fuel loads and longer tyre stints. Those conditions will lower the car and test whether the airflow remains stable as the tyres lose grip.
Hamilton starts fifth, with Leclerc sixth. Passing will remain difficult, but the Sprint showed Ferrari possesses competitive race pace.
Leclerc also proved that the soft tyre can survive longer than expected. Ferrari saved a fresh set, giving the team a useful option after a late Safety Car or during a short final stint.
The opening lap will matter. So will the undercut. Hamilton must attack Oscar Piastri without damaging his tyres behind the McLaren, while Leclerc needs a cleaner launch after admitting that his previous two starts had not gone smoothly.
The major SF-26 update has already passed the basic test. The floor produces real performance, and Hamilton’s recovery confirmed that Friday’s collapse did not come from a broken aerodynamic concept.
The bigger question remains unanswered. Can Ferrari keep both cars inside that razor-thin window for an entire Grand Prix, or will one side of the garage lose the balance again?
READ MORE: Kimi Antonelli Grid Penalty Confirmed for Italian Grand Prix by Toto Wolff
FAQs
What did Ferrari upgrade at Zandvoort?
Ferrari revised the SF-26 floor body, board, edges, diffuser geometry, and lower beam wing to create more stable downforce.
Why did Lewis Hamilton struggle in Sprint Qualifying?
Small setup changes left Hamilton with an unstable rear end. He said the SF-26 felt completely different from practice.
How close was Charles Leclerc to the Zandvoort Sprint pole?
Leclerc qualified third with a 1:11.622. He finished only 0.055 seconds behind George Russell’s pole lap.
Where did Leclerc overtake Lando Norris?
Leclerc passed Norris under braking at Tarzan, Zandvoort’s first corner, on Lap 18 of the Sprint.
Where did Hamilton and Leclerc qualify for the Dutch Grand Prix?
Hamilton qualified fifth with a 1:11.494. Leclerc started alongside him in sixth after recording a 1:11.558.
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