Lewis Hamilton believes Ferrari can challenge at the front in the 2026 F1 Malaysia round race after a surprise P2 qualifying finish.
The Ferrari driver had a difficult start to his Sepang weekend, taking P6 in FP1 and P5 in FP2 before avoiding a penalty for impeding to finish P6 in FP3. However, Hamilton delivered when it mattered in qualifying, improving significantly to secure P2 at the Q3 chequered flag, finishing just 0.298s off Max Verstappen’s pole time.
Hamilton on nexpected P2 in qualifying at the 2026 F1 Malaysia round
Speaking during the post-qualifying press conference, Hamilton explained that Ferrari had expected a P5 or P6 qualifying result based on its pace throughout Free Practice, where they looked a good 0.5-0.7 off in FP3.
“Yes, definitely. Firstly, congrats to Max. He’s been so quick all weekend. Yeah, we were kind of looking at fifth or sixth sort of throughout the weekend in the ultimate pace compared to the rest and we saw Mercedes come with a big upgrade and considering they’ve been winning every race, the upgrade would really propel them even further forwards.”
Despite those expectations, Hamilton found himself fighting at the front, while teammate Charles Leclerc qualified P5 but will start tomorrow’s race from P4 following Isack Hadjar’s grid penalty.
“But it’s just interesting to find ourselves here. The car felt great. We made lots of changes. You know, I think they’ve got a great package.”
The Brit further highlighted Ferrari’s straight-line disadvantage:
“Red Bull have obviously been making some great progress and I mean, the only place we lose is out in the straights to them. I think we’re losing three or four tenths on the straights to them, which we know of and so we just work as hard as we can to try and maximise in the corners. But I think we were able to do that today. So this is really down to the mechanics and the engineers. We all did a really great job together. And then also execution was like really on point. So if we could keep this up, hopefully we can get better results moving forwards.”
Ferrari’s set-up changes
Hamilton has endured a mixed 2026 F1 season so far, taking five podiums, including a win in Barcelona where he started from the front row. However, the Ferrari driver will be looking to return to the podium after a difficult run of results, finishing P6 in Monza, retiring in Madrid, and taking another P6 in Baku.
Asked about his chances of repeating his Barcelona victory and the impact of the changes, Hamilton shared:
“Yeah, I mean, the thing is that these cars are so sensitive. You make the smallest change and it’s ridiculous the difference it can make from one run, one session, to the other. One click of front wing, or one millimetre ride height, a quarter of a degree of camber, or 0.1 of toe, or something like that. These little things make such a big difference to balance, and it’s literally a moving target that you’re trying to work around with set-up and then also controls that we have.
“Even then, understanding throttle application. If you get on the throttle, if you get to full throttle too early, your ramp down starts early and you lose time down the straight,” he continued. “These kinds of things that I don’t think many of us like, but mastering all that together is a massive challenge and obviously makes it even harder for us because I think we’re so on the edge because we are losing so much on the straights. So I’m just hoping that we continue to work hard. If we get to a point where we have base power with these guys, I think we’re going to have even a better fight in the future.”
Eyes on Sunday’s race
With attention now turned to the 2026 F1 Malaysia round race, Hamilton remained cautious about Ferrari’s long-run pace.
“I mean, we just have to focus on ourselves. I don’t know what the others are doing. I think Max had really good long runs. Ours were ok, but I think the balance was a bit off. I think our car is better, hopefully, now for the race.”
“So yeah, I think we’re all in the same ballpark because overtaking is not that easy here either, even though we have these long straights. We’re all on SM and following is quite difficult because we’re always overheating. So it’ll be interesting tomorrow,” he concluded.
