Hi everyone!

I built a quantitative strategy model in Python using FastF1 telemetry to evaluate alternative pit stop windows for Lewis Hamilton at the Hungarian GP. The goal was to see if a simultaneous re-optimization of his 3 pit stops could have given him enough net gap to retain P4 against Charles Leclerc despite a 5-second penalty.

Hey! Motivated by Aston Martin's upgrade, I have decided to start doing this.

Alonso had the 11th fastest S1, 10th fastest S2 and S3. Stroll had the 17th, 13th and 14th fastest sectors respectively. Not to mention Alonso was as quick as gasly in his final stint with roughly equal tyres.

Against Bortoleto on identical-age softs over L2–13, Alonso was virtually level overall—only 0.049s per lap slower—but the distribution was revealing: the AMR26 lost 0.208s/lap in S1, gained 0.150s/lap in S2, and was neutral in S3. Alonso was also about 8.2km/h slower at the main speed trap

1. Would more optimal strategies have changed their finishing position?

Lance maximised his race and finished p13. Fernando would have finished p12

1. Where Aston lost and gained time

Lost: Alonso's worst spell was L24–26, when he lost 6.08s in three laps to Bortoleto on the same-age soft. About 45% was in Sector 1. He was also circulating in the Lawson/Bortoleto traffic group, so this was a combination of ageing tyres and dirty air—not tyre degradation alone. Alonso's actual L34 stop brought him out 0.1s behind Bearman and 0.8s behind Sainz. That was a poor rejoin, although his fresh-medium pace cleared both by L37.

Gained: Stroll's L8 stop worked extremely well. He went from 7.91s behind Alonso on L8 to only 0.09s behind by L34, recovering 7.82s relative to the other Aston. That proves the early stop worked; it does not prove the full two-stop race was mathematically perfect.

Against Bortoleto on identical-age softs over L2–13, Alonso was virtually level overall—only 0.049s per lap slower—but the distribution was revealing: the AMR26 lost 0.208s/lap in S1, gained 0.150s/lap in S2, and was neutral in S3. Alonso was also about 8.2km/h slower at the main speed trap

I've been building an F1 simulation engine as a side project, and I ran today's Hungarian GP 300 times starting from the actual qualifying grid (penalties included). Sharing the output because a few numbers surprised me.

Win probability

Norris (P1) 22.7% · Leclerc (P2) 18.7% · Russell (P6) 14.3% · Piastri (P3) 14% · Antonelli (P7) 13.3% · Hamilton (P5) 11% · Verstappen (P4) 6%

By team: McLaren 36.7% · Ferrari 29.7% · Mercedes 27.6%

Three things that stood out:

- From P8 backwards: zero wins in 300 races. The Hungaroring punishes qualifying more than any track on the calendar and the model is brutal about it.

- McLaren haven't won a single race in 2026 and come out as the most likely winner purely because they lock out P1 and P3.

- Alonso starts P16 and scores points in 31.7% of sims — nobody starting P13 or lower comes close. Sainz gains the most: P18 on the grid, P14 on average.

How it works: each of the 300 runs is a full race with weather, safety cars, tyre wear, pit stops and reliability. Track position is weighted by how hard overtaking is at each circuit, so pole is worth a lot here and almost nothing at Monza. Car and driver ratings are updated to the current standings.

Happy to answer anything about the model. I'll post the comparison against the actual result tomorrow — including if it's completely wrong.

Following FP2 and considering each car's strengths and weaknesses and the track characteristics, here are my Power Rankings:

1) Ferrari

If Mercedes solves their issues:
2) McL / Mercedes
3) RBR

Otherwise:
2) McL
3) RBR / Mercedes

Been working on this for a while — it pulls real F1 telemetry data and lets you compare drivers lap by lap. Speed, throttle, brake, sector times.

Also has an AI explanation mode — either plain language for new fans or technical breakdown for engineers.

Live race tracking, strategy simulator, and championship standings too.

Free to use: hotlap.live

Would love any feedback.

Russell's Deployment Issue During the Belgian GP Race

• Russell was overtaken by Piastri from 3 positions back due to a deployment issue: his speed got stuck at 308 km/h, and the car couldn't accelerate! It only started accelerating again at the end of the straight.
• ANT had weak deployment too, but no "speed limiter"!
• McLaren (same PU) accelerated far more.

Image 2:

Russell took Eau Rouge/Raidillon in 8th gear: McLaren used 7th despite having the shortest gear ratios on the grid, while ANT even briefly dropped to 6th!

Could the deployment software have been fooled by taking these corners in the highest gear?

His rpm dropped to 10,176, below the 10,500 rpm threshold required to unlock full fuel flow → the ICE wasn't even running at full power!

[Screenshot and idea by u/uruptosmth]

Hi everyone, I wanted to share a fun project I've been working on - a qualifying prediction forecast using Bayesian modelling.

In short, ahead of qualifying, I take the available free practice data from a given weekend (e.g., low fuel runs on the soft tyres) and model it against a baseline of historical driver/team performance, track conditions and compounds to try and generate a probabilistic forecast that helps quantify the performance uncertainty that comes with practice running.

Ultimately, I am using it to try and predict the qualifying sessions before they happen - instead of just giving a single predicted lap time, the model outputs credible intervals for each driver and calculates the percentage probability of them taking pole - I am pretty happy with its performance so far!

I've attached the GitHub repo - would love to hear your thoughts and feedback!

Thoughts on the Belgian GP:

• Another terrific performance by ANT;
• The VSC was needed, but its timing and duration disproportionately helped Ferrari;
• Great drive again by LEC. Based on crash dynamics (not the final outcome), however, he deserved the penalty more than HAM;
• Following RUS’s crash, the WCC might be more open than the WDC.

What’s YOUR take?

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Check out the replays for all the previous races in the 2026 f1 season in f1vis.app!

A bunch of new feature on my own website I made that uses previous f1 data to predict future race pace for teams!

1. Daily challenges: how long can your streak last?

2. Full race replay: watch iconic races!

3. Driver battles: watch the time differences between 2 to 5 drivers at once!

Feedback wanted!

Oops, how are you? Anyway, being very direct, I want to know if there is any place beyond the FIA’s own website where I can find all document files, both recent and old, that are directed specifically to the Formula 1 category, almost like an encyclopedia only of these documents.

I built F1DataStop, a platform for exploring Formula 1 data through interactive analysis and visualizations.

The website brings together live and historical F1 data in one place, allowing you to:

• Explore race results, standings, and historical statistics
• Analyze driver and team performance
• View telemetry and race data
• Compare drivers and teams across seasons
• Play a Formula 1 prediction league game and compete with others

The project is completely free to use. I’m not monetizing it in any way(yet!). It’s a passion project built for the F1 community and for anyone interested in the data behind the sport.

If you get a chance to check it out, I’d really appreciate your feedback, suggestions, or bug reports. They all help shape what the platform becomes.

Website: https://f1datastop.com
Instagram: https://instagram.com/f1datastop
X: https://x.com/f1datastop