Lewis Hamilton is on the brink of his 20th British GP as the 2026 edition of this race is about to begin. However, for only the second time in his life it will be without a Mercedes power unit behind him. And where last year was one of struggles, 2026 seems to be favouring the Ferrari driver a whole lot more.
Power deficit on the straights the achilles heel for Ferrari
Coming off a fifth place in Austria and a win before that in Barcelona, Hamilton feels Ferrari is still on the back foot compared to his former employer.
“Obviously we had some great performances before,” Hamilton looks back at the past few races. “The fact is, as you could see in the race, we lose quite a lot of time.
“I think it’s like four tenths that we lose in a straight line. It’s hard to recover that through corners. I think we’ve got a great car fundamentally, it’s just we’ve just got to continue to work to maximise what we can and get the best results we can, score as many points as we can until we can close that deficit.“
Silverstone is a power limited track. And on top of that, one with few significant braking zones. This begs the question whether Hamilton has the confidence to fight the Mercedes duo.
“It’s not that I’m not confident,” the seven-time champion says. “It’s that the fact is we’ve got long straights. I think this is going to be the most unprecedented weekend in terms of the power deployment.
“All us drivers have been talking on the drivers’ chat, just [about] how poor the power is going to be through this track. We run out of battery power.
“There’s only a few corners to charge the engine, so the K will be switched off for a large portion of the lap and that’s where we will struggle probably the most. The deficit could be twice as big.”
Nothing but love for Hamilton’s home track
As the most laureated F1 driver at the British GP, with an almost 50% win percentage, Hamilton knows how special Silverstone is. So when finding out that 2026 would be his 20th, he beemed with enthusiasm.
“I think it’s my twentieth year, right? Someone told me my twentieth year, so it’s been building for a long, long time, since my first pole position here in 2007. It’s phenomenal when you come here.
“I heard that we’re going to have the biggest crowd this weekend that we’ve probably ever had. And I mean, it’s such a privilege for us Brits to be here representing the country, also in the height of all this great sporting moment.
“You’ve got Wimbledon going on, the World Cup as well, with England winning yesterday, it was good as well.”
As always, the crowd at Silverstone will be (mostly) behind Hamilton. But he does not feel it as pressure, but rather as a privilege to be supported by so many of his compatriots.
“It’s not a pressure thing,” he explains. “It’s like they’re helping push you along. So, it’s just encouraging and it’s unbelievable to experience. You can’t really put into words how you feel when you see the cars, when you see all the flags and you see people supporting you as you travel around the circuit.
“It is one of those circuits that you do get to also see them in the distance. When you’re going down Stowe straight, for example, going around Turn 7, you kind of see them all lined up and just cheering on the whole way.”
Ferrari engineers leeching Hamilton’s Silverstone experience
With one win shy of a decade of Silverstone wins, Lewis Hamilton is the expert on how to cross the chequered flag first on Sunday. And the Ferrari engineers wanted to use every bit of info they could get from him.
Hamilton explains: “My engineers, they have been asking me like, ‘How did you do it? What did you do? How do you normally run the car?’
“And so, I hope that I’ve steered them in the right direction. But we only have one practice session tomorrow, so it’s going to be definitely a challenge throughout.“
But even with all of his experience, F1 winningest driver stays focused. The Briton hopes his home crowd will give him the speed needed to complete the decade of wins.
“And I’m really not thinking about the trophy,” he explains. “I mean, it’s not something I think any of the drivers actually think about. You think about just obviously executing the best you can through the weekend, trying to bring the right energy, absorbing the amazing energy that we have here from all the fans.
“I think Nigel [Mansell] said it best, that on your home turf you get that extra bit of speed coming from the energy from the fans. So, I’m hoping that propels us and helps us close the gaps for those guys that are ahead.”
