Hamilton claims stellar maiden Grand Prix victory for Ferrari in Barcelona as Antonelli suffers shock retirement

Lewis Hamilton secured a magnificent maiden Grand Prix victory for Ferrari in Barcelona to bring Mercedes’ 2026 winning streak to an end, beating George Russell and Lando Norris while Kimi Antonelli failed to finish the race.

Although Ferrari’s initial choice to start the Briton on soft tyres didn’t help him take the lead on the opening lap, they gambled on a three-stop strategy which played out flawlessly as Hamilton gained a free stop under a Virtual Safety Car.

He delivered a series of stunning laps to gradually increase his advantage over the Silver Arrows and claim his first win in nearly two years, cutting down Antonelli’s lead in the Standings at the same time.

Russell was forced to settle for P2 while Norris took P3 for McLaren, marking the first all-British podium since 1968. It wasn’t an easy drive for the Mercedes man as he was passed by his team mate late in the race before Antonelli’s unfortunate retirement on Lap 62 of 66.

Red Bull were fourth and sixth, with Max Verstappen outperforming Isack Hadjar, while Oscar Piastri secured P5 to take a solid points haul for the reigning Constructors’ Champions.

The Alpine duo of Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto enjoyed a fantastic day in P7 and P8, although the Argentine driver is set to be investigated after the race for a yellow flag infringement. They were joined in the top-10 by Racing Bulls’ Liam Lawson and Arvid Lindblad, scoring double points for a second consecutive race.

Gabriel Bortoleto and Carlos Sainz followed in 11th and 12th ahead of the last of the finishers in Haas’ Esteban Ocon and Cadillac’s Sergio Perez. Alex Albon wasn't classified and was eight laps behind his rivals after pitting to fix a problem with his Williams.

There were seven official DNFs in total, all caused by a variety of car issues. The biggest shocks were Standings leader Antonelli and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, both of whom endured DNFs late on.

Aston Martin endured a dismal day as both Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso failed to take the chequered flag, while Cadillac ended Valtteri Bottas’ race as a precaution. After running in the points early on, Nico Hulkenberg was also unable to finish the Grand Prix for Audi, and Ollie Bearman was a late retiree with Haas.

AS IT HAPPENED

Following his rollercoaster weekend in Monaco, which saw him drop 68 points behind team mate Antonelli in the Standings, Russell came back fighting when he hit the track in Barcelona. Starting off strong by topping the times in FP1 and FP3, he carried the momentum through to Qualifying to secure pole position by just 0.064s.

He would face tough competition on the grid with the lead Ferrari of Hamilton lining up alongside him, as well as a fired-up Antonelli who was determined to gain positions after he failed to qualify on the front row for the first time this season.

As teams switched their focus to the race, it was confirmed that Alonso would start from the pit lane for his home race due to Aston Martin replacing the ESME and MGU-K in his car – the Spaniard had originally qualified P22 so had little to lose from the change.

The pit lane would likely see plenty more action throughout the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix as a result of the scorching track temperatures, which were already surpassing 50 Celsius before the formation lap and would contribute significantly to tyre degradation, especially with Pirelli allocating teams softer tyres compared to last year.

With a two-stop strategy predicted, it was revealed when the tyre blankets were removed that most had opted to start on the medium compound, with some notable exceptions – Hamilton, seeking an aggressive launch, Verstappen (P5), Hulkenberg (P9), Colapinto (P13), Sainz (P16), Ocon (P17) and Perez (P19) all chose the higher-grip soft tyres.

Elsewhere, Aston Martin were the only ones to go for the hard compound, suggesting that they would go for a longer opening stint and try to move up the order whilst those around them pitted for fresh tyres.

When the lights went out in Spain for the hottest Grand Prix of the year so far, Russell held off Hamilton with a brilliant reaction to maintain the race lead, while Antonelli, Norris and Verstappen also remained in their Qualifying positions just behind.

The second Ferrari of Leclerc, who crashed out of Q3 and had to settle for P10, gained three places on the opening lap to provide a stark contrast to Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar, who tumbled from P6 to P14.

Keen to make up for his torrid start, the Frenchman began to make his way back towards the points with bold overtakes around the outside of Williams’ Sainz, but he still had plenty of traffic to tackle to salvage a top-10 finish.

Another driver who suffered a poor launch was Bortoleto – the Audi man hadn’t quite been able to match his team mate’s pace throughout the weekend and qualified P12, but was bogged down at lights out and dropped to P17.

The first retirement of the day came on Lap 6 when Stroll was instructed to box as Aston Martin noticed a problem with his gearbox, bringing an early end to his day.

Hadjar continued on his charge with clever passes on the Alpine pair of Gasly and Colapinto as Leclerc was similarly looking to improve. Heading into Turn 3, the Monegasque sailed around the outside of Piastri and made the move stick to take P6, setting his sights on Verstappen up ahead.

Back at the front, Russell had opened up a gap of around three seconds over Hamilton and set the fastest lap of the race, but it was clear that the tyre performance was quickly falling away – over the first 10 laps, the Mercedes driver had lost nearly two seconds of pace, confirming that tyre management would prove to be crucial.

Norris, running fourth, was also beginning to encounter trouble as he reported “sliding everywhere” on the medium compound. Verstappen similarly claimed that he was “wobbling” even on the straights, so it wasn’t a surprise when the frontrunners began to pit at the Lap 12 mark.

Hamilton was the first to do so, switching to the hard tyres before leader Russell joined him shortly after. The Silver Arrows carried out the stop perfectly, allowing him to maintain position over Ferrari and return to the track in P5.

Several competitors followed suit over the next few laps, including Norris and Verstappen, but disaster struck for Lawson as Racing Bulls executed a 6.3s pit stop, seeing him plummet out of the points as the first stint came to a close.

Despite worrying that he was now “exposed” to his team mate, Russell regained the lead once Leclerc pitted on Lap 16 after marginally extending to cover off Piastri, with the top seven remaining as they were before the stops.

Further back, a technical issue for Bottas resulted in his third retirement of the season with Cadillac, leaving 20 drivers left in the race. Of those, Hadjar was the one continuing to improve the most as he passed Lawson for P10 before moving up another spot when Haas finally called Bearman into the pits.

Just outside of the top-10, Alpine deployed team orders to get Gasly up to P12 ahead of Colapinto, with the Argentine driver complaining that his team mate was “not even pushing” before the instruction came through.

On the topic of intra-team battles, Antonelli was heard checking that Mercedes were happy for him to push whilst running in third place, and he soon began to lap around five-tenths faster than Russell and Hamilton up ahead. However, the top-three were nowhere near as close to each other as Lawson, Hulkenberg and Gasly in a contest for P9.

On Lap 23, Lindblad became the last of the drivers to pit before Ferrari called Hamilton back in, implying that they were risking a three-stop strategy. It was a gamble that seemed to pay off straight away thanks to a stellar first lap on fresh medium tyres, handing him the net race lead as he started to post times around 2.5s quicker than Russell.

With the fastest lap now under Hamilton’s belt, it looked like a thrilling battle was developing at the front as Antonelli – who had been shown the black and white flag for track limits – closed to within a second of Russell. The Italian wasn’t the only one picking up the pace as Leclerc let his Ferrari team mate sail past for P4, keeping Hamilton firmly in contention for victory.

Despite seemingly having more speed and grip, Antonelli’s brave attack on the race leader was held back by the threat of being slapped with a time penalty for exceeding track limits. He refused to let Russell escape up the road, but his race engineer was eager to maintain position and warned the 19-year-old: “Let’s not slow each other down by racing.”

While they were concerned about Norris closing down their advantage, the McLaren driver headed back in for another set of tyres, forcing Mercedes’ hand. Russell pitted, followed by Antonelli as they aimed to cover off Norris, allowing Hamilton to finally take the lead with a buffer of 16s over his former team mate.

Acutely aware that this could be their greatest opportunity yet to win a race, Ferrari warned Hamilton that they would have to pit again. Even with Russell overtaking Leclerc for P2, the Scuderia were handed an incredible chance to hold onto first place when Alonso pulled off the track to retire from his home Grand Prix.

A Virtual Safety Car ensured that everyone had to drive at a restricted speed and Ferrari called the Briton into the pits to complete his final stop, seamlessly helping him hold onto the lead with 24 laps to go. When he returned to the circuit, he had an advantage of just under three seconds over Russell, but his fresh hard tyres put him in the best place to end Mercedes’ winning streak.

As the laps ticked down, the seven-time World Champion consistently increased his lead while Antonelli and Norris bunched up behind Russell, with McLaren reminding their driver that a podium could be possible while the 19-year-old was still at risk of being penalised for track limits.

That danger didn’t go away for Antonelli as, after making it clear that he felt he had more pace than his team mate, he was reported to the FIA by McLaren – they insisted that he had gone over the white line too many times, which would play perfectly into Norris’ hands as he stayed close behind.

In the end, they didn't need to bank on a penalty as with five laps to go, the battle between Russell and Antonelli came to a head. The Italian fought his way past to snatch P2, but there was more drama to come – he broke his end plate and gradually slowed before pulling onto the grass, marking what could be a critical moment in the title fight.

Almost simultaneously, Leclerc took a trip through the gravel and reported that his power steering was broken, forcing him into retirement too. A second Virtual Safety Car was deployed while the Mercedes was pushed behind the barriers, but Hamilton’s lead was too great for Russell to challenge for the win again.

Hamilton ultimately crossed the line 19.5s ahead of Russell, with Norris making the podium an all-British affair. Red Bull added to their points tally with Verstappen and Hadjar placing fourth and sixth respectively, sandwiching the second McLaren of Piastri.

Midfield teams Alpine and Racing Bulls occupied the rest of the top-10 as Gasly took P7 ahead of Colapinto, Lawson and Lindblad. Significantly further behind was Audi’s Bortoleto in P11, finishing in front of Sainz, Ocon and Perez. Albon was not classified as a finisher, as he was eight laps behind the Cadillac, and both Williams drivers will be investigated after the race for starting procedure infringements.

Leclerc and Antonelli were the last of the event’s seven retirees, joining Bearman, Alonso, Hulkenberg, Bottas and Stroll in not reaching the chequered flag.

Key quote

"First I have to start and say a huge grazia to everyone here, my team here at Ferrari, everyone back at the factory, Fred for believing in me and bringing me to this team," said Hamilton. "I started out a dream last year which seemed almost impossible during my time last year, but we never gave up hope and the team just continued to lift me up. We made so many changes and we made so many improvements, and on top of that I’ve got the greatest fanbase a sportsman could ever ask for. Thank you, thank you to everybody."

What's next

With the double header complete, drivers and teams will now take some time to reset before they return to action at the Austrian Grand Prix over the weekend of June 26-28. Head to the RACE HUB to find out how you can follow the action from the Red Bull Ring.