Ferrari have two drivers fighting for the world championship, a new floor arriving at Zandvoort, a power unit upgrade coming at Monza, and absolutely no idea which driver to back. That is not a great position to be in when the man you are chasing, Kimi Antonelli, is sitting 50 points clear of your best hope and showing no signs of cracking.
Lost in the Maze
According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, the mood inside Maranello is one of genuine confusion. The phrase being used, apparently, is that Ferrari are “lost in a labyrinth of possibilities.” It is a wonderfully dramatic way of saying they cannot make a decision. With both Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc still mathematically in the title fight, the team are caught between two equally uncomfortable options: pick the wrong driver and look foolish, or pick nobody and hand Antonelli a free pass to the title.
Hamilton sits second in the standings on 169 points, 50 behind Antonelli. Leclerc is fourth on 138, a full 81 off the lead. On paper, Hamilton is the logical choice to back. He is closer to the top, and his consistency this season has been remarkable. The seven-time world champion is the only driver in the field to have completed every single racing lap of every Grand Prix weekend so far this season. That is not luck. That is someone who knows exactly what he is doing.
Leclerc Has His Arguments Too
But write off Charles Leclerc at your peril. The Monégasque has been Ferrari’s cornerstone since 2019. He won the British Grand Prix and has beaten Hamilton in three of the last few races. The head-to-head numbers are remarkably tight: Hamilton leads in races 6-5, Leclerc leads in qualifying 6-5, and sprint races are level at 2-2. This is not a situation where one driver has clearly outclassed the other. The championship gap exists largely because of a retirement in Monaco, where Leclerc crashed in the closing stages, and a hydraulic failure that cost him further points in Barcelona while Hamilton was taking the team’s first win of the season.
Strip out the bad luck and the gap between the teammates shrinks considerably. Which is precisely what makes Ferrari’s decision so painful.
Leave Him Alone, Says Szafnauer
Former Alpine and Racing Point team principal Otmar Szafnauer has weighed in on whether Ferrari should be having difficult conversations with Leclerc about his form, as reported by PlanetF1.com.
“No. Leave him alone. I would not have a conversation, but be supportive. Lewis at the beginning of the year, and I’m not speaking from facts, just the feeling I get, was a little bit more ahead of Leclerc than he is now. I think Charles has stepped it up in the last two a little bit towards Lewis.” – Otmar Szafnauer
It is advice worth listening to. Leclerc does not need a lecture. He needs a car he feels comfortable in, a team that trusts him, and a few weekends where the gremlins stay in their box. Former Ferrari strategist Rob Smedley made a similar point, though he framed it in a way that will sting slightly more.
“I think this is the first time in a long time with Charles where his teammate has had a significant upper hand. Charles wasn’t happy with the car. I know that they changed components around the braking system, types of material and stuff like that, but it felt like he was just slightly lost for a driver of his experience and how good he is.” – Rob Smedley
“Slightly lost” is a phrase that will echo around Maranello. Leclerc changed to Carbone Industries brake pads and discs after the Monaco crash, a switch made at the Barcelona Grand Prix. The signs are that the adjustment is working, with his last two performances showing an upward trajectory. Ferrari would be rather foolish to destabilise him now with pointed conversations about who is the team leader.
Technical Hope on the Horizon
There is at least some good news on the development front. Ferrari arrive at Zandvoort with a new floor designed to address several persistent weaknesses on the SF-26. Further upgrades follow at Monza, where the car will also receive a revised power unit featuring modifications to the turbocharger via the ADUO system. It will be Ferrari’s second engine upgrade of 2026, and it cannot come soon enough for a team that started the season playing catch-up to Mercedes.
The car is getting better. Whether the team’s decision-making is getting better is a separate, thornier question. Mercedes remain ahead of the field with structural advantages that go beyond raw pace, and Ferrari closing the gap technically only makes their internal political situation more pressurised, not less. Every race in which both drivers are free to race each other is a race in which one of them might take points off the other rather than off Antonelli.
The Zandvoort Test
The Dutch Grand Prix is a sprint format weekend, which means points are on offer from Saturday as well as Sunday. That adds another layer of complexity to Ferrari’s non-decision. If Hamilton and Leclerc end up scrapping wheel-to-wheel during the sprint or the main race, while Antonelli drives serenely to another podium, even the most optimistic Ferrari fan will start asking uncomfortable questions about the team’s strategic courage.
For context on just how much is at stake this weekend, you can check the full Dutch GP schedule and sprint format breakdown, with races and sprint events starting at times listed in UTC, see the full schedule in your local time.
Ferrari’s official line, for now, is that they will let the next few races determine who has the stronger title credentials before making any call. That sounds reasonable. It also sounds like something people say when they do not want to make a difficult call.
The Uncomfortable Truth
Here is the reality Ferrari need to confront before the summer slips away entirely: at 50 points down with a limited number of races remaining, Hamilton is the logical horse to back. He is closer, he is more consistent, and he is a seven-time world champion who knows how to win a title fight under pressure. None of that diminishes Leclerc, who has every right to keep pushing until the maths makes it impossible.
But Formula 1 titles are not won by committees who are “lost in a labyrinth of possibilities.” They are won by teams willing to make brutal, occasionally unpopular decisions at exactly the right moment. Ferrari have a history of getting that moment wrong. The longer they wait, the more likely they are to repeat it, while Antonelli and Mercedes drive calmly into the distance.
