Allan McNish has opened up about Audi’s prospects in the midfield battle in the second half of the 2026 F1 season, whether they will introduce more upgrades, how impressive Nico Hülkenberg’s performance was at the Dutch GP, and why their overall execution has improved in recent rounds.
While the German driver cleared Q1 and set the thirteenth fastest time of the session, Gabriel Bortoleto found himself ninth in Grand Prix qualifying.
At the end of the first lap on Sunday, the Brazilian lost control of his car on a treacherous patch of wet track, which had claimed Max Verstappen a few moments before. He was able to avoid the barriers, and, remarkably, Hülkenberg dodged a collision with his teammate thanks to his incredible reflex.
Following a restart, the 39-year-old pulled off an S-S-H two-stopper and climbed from P12 to P8. The 4 points he scored at Zandvoort lifted the team’s total to 16.
Meanwhile, Bortoleto started in seventeenth place following his lap-one spin. Nonetheless, he managed to recover some ground and came home in P13.
As it stands, Audi sit eighth in the Constructors’ standings, 5 points behind Haas in seventh. They are chased by Williams, whose haul of points has amounted to 11 thus far.
McNish on how Audi would do in the F1 midfield battle in the season’s second half
Audi’s Racing Director Allan McNish spoke at length in a post-Dutch GP print media session on how he expects the tight battle in the midfield for the final points-scoring positions to pan out in the latter half of the 2026 F1 campaign.
Admitting that Fernando Alonso successfully executing a one-stop strategy at Zandvoort had surprised him, the Brit also pointed out how Alpine—especially with Pierre Gasly delivering strong results—are often challenging for a points finish.
“Yeah, so you’re right. Alonso’s pace, doing a one-stop was actually quite surprising at the end. He was pretty quick in FP1. It didn’t seem to come together on Saturday for them but today was a bit better.
“At the same time, Alpine definitely; Gasly is in the fight. But Pierre, always in qualifying, is in the fight; he does a good job there. But in the race pace they seem to be a bit better.”
Highlighting the edge the top four teams have on the rest of the grid, McNish admitted that the competition among the midfield teams for a couple of points each race is very tough. At the same time, he commented on how imperative it is to nail their execution to capitalise on the limited opportunities during a race weekend.
“I think there’s no question that’s going to be a very hard fight, and you’re fighting for one or two positions at the end. Because the group of four teams have got an advantage, and that’s too big of an advantage to catch up,
“And so, from our point of view, there’s quite a lot of focus on just execution, making sure that we get everything neat and tidy as much as we can, because then we can pick up the opportunities.”
Whether Audi are bringing more upgrades
Asked if Audi will upgrade the R26 in the remaining rounds, Allan McNish stated that their key priority is to reinforce the foundation for the upcoming seasons rather than primarily focusing on the outcome of the 2026 F1 season.
“We will have to keep on moving ahead with the car. However, in practice the reality is, I would say, the majority of the focus now for everybody is more on to future years than necessarily the end of this particular battle.”
Noting how they had last introduced a major upgrade package at the Red Bull Ring, McNish claimed that their baseline car is pretty fast despite the lack of regular updates. Although not confirming whether Audi have more upgrades in the pipeline, he maintained that the R26 boasts a solid platform they can build on further.
“I think our car is pretty quick anyway, the base part of it, because we were here without any upgrades really from when we were in Austria.
“In that respect, we’ve had detail but nothing serious. And so, I think the base car is pretty quick at the moment, and that’s a good base to build on.”
Audi’s strategy for Hülkenberg at Zandvoort
In terms of tyre performance influencing Audi’s strategy calls at the 2026 Dutch GP and whether track position was more important than overall pace in the battle for points among the midfield F1 teams, Allan McNish explained that the Pirelli rubber holding on well had allowed them to be quite flexible and aggressive with Hülkenberg’s race.
Describing how Audi had prevented Yuki Tsunoda from undercutting them, the 56-year-old commended Hülkenberg for fully utilising the grip of the softest compound. He underlined how the German managed to overtake multiple drivers in the second stint—Gasly in particular—after boxing on Lap 20 and built a comfortable gap of over 12 seconds to Alonso in the end.
“We were in a good position today. With the tyre, I think we were in a good place. I think we were pretty good on that.
“So, with Nico [Hülkenberg], which was predominantly the one that we had the most flexibility. With Nico, then what we did was cover off Tsunoda, and by covering off Tsunoda, then we were able to get ahead of him because he pitted a lap earlier.
“And from that perspective, we went for a soft tyre at an aggressive point with Nico, and he used that extremely well to overtake, get through the traffic, and then to also pull a gap. And then the second pit stop from there was really quite, I would say, straightforward.”
McNish comments on why Hülkenberg’s performance at the 2026 F1 Dutch GP was praiseworthy
Emphasising how Zandvoort is a circuit where overtaking is pretty challenging, Allan McNish reiterated that Hülkenberg deserves plaudits for his aggressive overtakes and successful execution of the two-stopper. He added that his impressive second stint on the fresh softs had contributed significantly to the comfortable cushion they built and eventual P8 finish.
“But the thing was to be able to get through the traffic. So, there’s one thing about the strategy of putting it into place. The second thing is having the driver to be able to execute it and take it, and that’s what he [Hülkenberg] did very well.
“Because you could see with Gasly coming up on the back of Fernando and still not being able to overtake. And it was the same with Arvid, because there were people queuing up behind him and he was in a much older tyre.
“It’s not an easy place to overtake around here; it can be possible but it’s not an easy one.
“So, from our perspective definitely with Nico then it was a little bit of both looking ahead to what we could do but also using the advantage that we had when we could, and which was on the soft tyre in that second stint.”
McNish notes Audi’s confidence boost after poor run of form in the midfield
With regard to Audi scoring points in the last four rounds and what their improved execution actually entails, Allan McNish responded, “I think it’s a little bit of everything, to be honest with you.”
The 3-time winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans asserted that Audi are always ready to tackle anything a race weekend throws at them. Additionally, he emphasised how their recent resurgence has imbued the drivers and the rest of the team with extra confidence as far as execution is concerned.
McNish specifically called attention to how good Audi’s pit stops in F1 have been in the previous few rounds and claimed that Bortoleto’s final stop at the 2026 Dutch GP was decent, despite encountering a minor issue with the left rear tyre.
“It’s making sure that you are prepared for the eventualities that come up.
“There’s also a little bit of a point where, and this is the same for a driver, it’s the same for a team or anybody, when you break the duck, when you get the first points, then there’s an element of confidence on the delivery.
“And we saw that with the mechanics and the pit stops. If you look at the pit stop timing, they’ve been super good even when we had a back-to-back stop a couple of races ago, and the second one was absolutely spot on. The only one that was not ideal here today was the left rear on the last stop for Gabi [Bortoleto] but it was still a pretty good stop.”
McNish reveals why Audi’s execution has improved in recent rounds
Proclaiming that Audi are heading in the right direction, Allan McNish surmised that the injection of fresh blood into the squad and increased collaboration have improved their overall execution.
The Brit maintained that multiple factors have contributed to the progress they have made, including better exploitation of the resources they boast. Furthermore, he restated that building everything from the ground up as a new works team has also enhanced their compatibility.
“So, I think it’s an element of confidence of everybody able to execute it, and we know that we’re going in the right direction.
“But fundamentally people starting to work together as well because there’s new people into the team, myself included.
“So, from that perspective, I wouldn’t say it’s one thing. I think it’s a lot of things, but it’s also the knowledge of what we’ve got and how to get the best out of it including drivers, including engineers, including strategy, tyre.
“You build up an element of understanding. But also, you know, we’re quite fresh, and there’s a big part of the whole team being a power unit that is completely fresh without previous experience, and so there’s an element there as well.”
