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Haas driver Ollie Bearman says seeing his former Formula 2 team-mate Kimi Antonelli take on Mercedes team-mate George Russell has given him belief he can one day fight at the front in Formula 1. Bearman said: "I'm not fighting at the front, I'm not in a top-four car, unlike those two, but seeing that they can take the fight to their team mates, and take the fight to the other competitors around them, also gives me a sense of belief for myself. I was fighting with them in F2 and F3, and now they're fighting with the top guys [in F1], so it's another proof to me that one day I can do it as well."
Toto Wolff says it is still unclear whether Mercedes’ latest upgrade package has delivered the performance gain the team expected, despite another strong weekend after introducing its first significant updates of the season in Montreal. Wolff said: "At times, I felt like it didn't bring the performance gains that we had expected on paper, but it's very difficult to assess. We didn't see the McLarens [in the grand prix] at all, and we had the pace, we had the gap, but how much that is, is it what we have anticipated? I think it's very difficult to judge yet."
Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies said Isack Hadjar delivered a “very strong weekend” at the Canadian Grand Prix after the Frenchman finished fifth despite receiving two penalties. Mekies said: "I think Isack did a very strong weekend. This weekend he was on the right window straight away. I think speed was not the issue. The one-minute penalty is a bit too much. I think he got probably close to a one-minute penalty. But in terms of underlying speed, he was at the right level."
Max Verstappen says he does not want his daughter Lily in the Formula 1 paddock for now because she is too young to remember it and he wants to protect her privacy. Verstappen said: "I don't want her in the picture right now. She has to decide for herself later whether she wants that or not. That is why I don't want her in the paddock now. Firstly, because she won't remember it later anyway, but also with privacy in mind. A baby or young child should lead a carefree life."
Aston Martin chief trackside officer Mike Krack says the team may have lowered Fernando Alonso’s seat position too far after the Spaniard retired from the Canadian Grand Prix with back pain. Krack said: "He has been uncomfortable for a while, and never to the point where it was really a showstopper, but it's like a pressure point where you feel it gets worse and worse. I think we need to reconsider a little bit the positioning of the seat. When you look at how the drivers used to sit over the last few years, it goes more and more into a lying position, and we need to check whether we may have gone a step too far. But it's something we need to check."
Max Verstappen says Formula 1 needs to be “more pure” and that the proposed 2027 change to the power-unit power split is the “minimum necessary” to make racing feel more natural. Verstappen said: "For me, F1 just needs to be more pure and I really hope that what they try to do next year will go through, because I think that is necessary, the minimum necessary, to make it a bit more natural and a bit more back to normal, or at least a bit more pure racing."
2025 Formula 2 champion Leonardo Fornaroli has completed a two-day Testing of Previous Cars run for McLaren at the Circuit of the Americas, driving the 2023 MCL60 and covering 77 laps on his first outing at Austin. The Italian, who joined McLaren’s Driver Development programme at the end of 2025 and now serves as a test and reserve driver, said the Texas programme was more demanding than his April test at Silverstone: “The run plan was a step up from my last test in Silverstone. We got to do some practice starts, which continued to give me a better understanding of what it takes to drive an F1 car in a session.”
Mercedes deputy team principal Bradley Lord said George Russell and Kimi Antonelli told the team to “trust us to race each other” after their Canadian Grand Prix battles led to discussions with Toto Wolff. Bradley Lord said: "After the sprint, there was a sit down and a chat with Toto and the two drivers just talking about how the sprint had gone and how they wanted to race each other going forward. That was actually a very constructive and very amicable conversation, but the message from the drivers was really, really clear. 'Trust us to race each other. That's what you've hired us to do, and we can do it'."
Williams team principal James Vowles says Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz “want to be part of this journey” at the team, as he looks to show progress after Williams dropped from fifth in the 2025 constructors’ standings to eighth currently. James Vowles said: "In terms of silly season, speak to Alex, speak to Carlos; they want to be part of this journey, and that's the best I can tell you. My job in this is to make sure they want to as well."
Cadillac team principal Graeme Lowdon says there is “no truth” to rumours the team is prepared to drop Valtteri Bottas after five grands prix this season. Graeme Lowdon said: "There is no foundation, no truth in any of the rumours at all. I can categorically say that. I'll make it really, really clear: factually, they're completely incorrect. There's no basis of truth whatsoever in any of them."
Mercedes technical director James Allison says George Russell’s retirement from the Canadian Grand Prix was caused by a catastrophic battery failure that triggered an engine kill. Allison said: "It was an engine kill that was caused by a failure in the battery, which just suffered a catastrophic failure a third of the way into the race and brought George's race to an end there. We can see enough at the end of the race that the battery was fairly unhappy, some heat damage there, and we'll have to figure out in the coming days and weeks exactly what caused that and put it right."
Lewis Hamilton says he will not be giving Kimi Antonelli advice in his F1 2026 title battle with Mercedes team-mate George Russell, but praised Toto Wolff for putting the “right support” around the teenager. Hamilton said: "I think you forget that we're competitors, so he's already doing a great job. I'm not going to give him any more pointers! I think things were a lot different back then. I don't think I had the same support system that he has, for example, today in the place that I worked at, and worked in. Toto did a great job of surrounding you with the right support and I definitely didn't feel that."
Carlos Sainz says the FIA should take a “very strong approach” and push through a proposed change to F1’s 2027 engine power split from 50:50 to 60:40, even if some manufacturers oppose it. Sainz said: "Because if they say it should be like that, I'm pretty sure that teams who are complaining or maybe not fully aligned with them will have no choice other than to do it. Obviously, everyone needs to agree, but at the same time, if it is for the good of the sport, for the good of the racing and the show, I'm a big fan of the rulers taking a very strong approach and a strong stance."
Fernando Alonso says Aston Martin will have to wait for upgrades around the summer break to get a performance step forward, after he felt the team showed better pace at the Canadian Grand Prix. Alonso said: "We seemed to be faster here than we were in Miami with the same package. We need to wait for performance to come with our upgrades around the summer break, but we will look to keep optimising this package until then."
Laurent Mekies says it is his understanding that Gianpiero Lambiase is joining McLaren with the aim of becoming team principal, despite McLaren announcing he will take up the chief racing officer role when he arrives in 2028 after leaving Red Bull. Mekies said: "Look, it's certainly my understanding that GP is going to McLaren to become a team principal. That's what I told you at the time. Obviously, we had a number of conversations before he was going to make the decision. Now don't ask me if it's going to happen, the timing of it is none of my business. I can just tell you the content of our conversations."
George Russell says he would like to compete in the Nürburgring 24 Hours one day after watching Max Verstappen take part in this year’s race, but added Verstappen is in a different position because Russell is still chasing his first Formula 1 world title. Russell said: "All of us are in a slightly different position to Max. Obviously, we're also pursuing to win a world championship, but obviously, he's in a luxurious position to do what he enjoys. And yeah, that's great for him. And he did a great job."
Max Verstappen says he is not willing to do a full rally test despite an invitation from nine-time World Rally champion Sebastien Ogier, because he sees rallying as “too high a risk”. Verstappen said: "I think it's really cool. But I just think about if I make a mistake and I hit that tree, the tree is not moving, and that for me is my limit. That, for me, is something that I don't want to do. It's too high a risk. It's a bit different, in my head at least, and it's just a risk that I'm not willing to take."
The FIA will require a Monaco-specific engine mode at the Monaco Grand Prix to limit straightline speed on the street circuit, where the 2026 cars can harvest energy easily and would otherwise carry too much deployment for the layout. In the mandated ‘Rev 1’ setting, MGU-K deployment must start tapering from its 350kW limit at 200km/h instead of 290km/h in the standard ‘Base’ mode, and cars will have no battery deployment left once they reach 300km/h; overtake mode still applies, but only leaves 150kW at 300km/h before dropping to zero by 310km/h. The restriction sits alongside Monaco having no straight-mode activation zones, with the FIA’s aim being to reduce the safety risk of cars arriving at corner entries too quickly.
David Croft said there is a push from the Saudi side to restore the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix to the 2026 calendar in the gap between Azerbaijan and Singapore on October 2-4, which would create a new triple-header, although Bahrain is also understood to be under consideration and any decision remains dependent on the situation in the Middle East after both races were cancelled in April. Croft said after speaking to someone “closely associated” with the Jeddah event in Montreal: “There is a desire to have that race in Jeddah run this year, potentially between Baku and Singapore. There is that week’s gap, so we could turn it into a triple-header... Bahrain might be an option for that one as well, depending on what the situation is in that part of the world.”
Lewis Hamilton says he will probably not use Ferrari’s simulator to prepare for races because he feels it carries “too many risks”, although he would consider using it to help the team correlate the simulator with what he feels in the real car. Hamilton said: "The simulator, I mean, I'm sure I would drive it at some point. I think what could be good is, for example, going back and doing a correlation to this weekend so we can find out where it's missing. Now, whether or not I use it to prepare for another race? Probably not. There are just too many risks. It's a tool that can be powerful. But for me, I'm old school. I'm probably better without it."
Lewis Hamilton says Ferrari is “massively down” on power compared to Mercedes and that it is stopping the team fighting them during the 2026 Formula 1 season, after finishing second at the Canadian Grand Prix. Hamilton said: "If you take away the power deficit, we're in the fight with these guys. But unfortunately that's not the way it is today. Even when you get the overtake [mode], when you get within a second, they still pull away. So that's how much grunt that they have, and we're massively down. But I really hope with this new rule that enables us to try to improve some performance, so we can get back in the fight with them."
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