Mercedes, record-breaking start
The closer we got to the 2026 World Championship, the more rumors circulated in the paddock about Mercedes‘ superiority. The rumors have become reality, and now Formula 1 finds itself once again dominated by Toto Wolff’s team. The W17 driven by George Russell and Kimi Antonelli swept the competition in Melbourne, Shanghai, and Suzuka, missing out on a 1-2 finish only in Japan. And such clear expressions of initial superiority almost always translate into a title.
For the 17th time in 77 championships, a team has won the first three races of the season: on all previous occasions, the team has brought home at least one title between Drivers and Constructors, while in 16 out of 17 cases, they celebrated the Drivers’ World Championship at the end of the year.
The exception dates back 50 years: in 1976, Ferrari started very strong, winning the events at Interlagos and Kyalami with Niki Lauda and at Long Beach with Clay Regazzoni. The title, as is well known, went to James Hunt, but the Nürburgring crash (which sidelined the Austrian for three GPs) and the Fuji downpour, under which Lauda himself refused to race, still scarred by what happened to him months earlier, had a decisive impact.
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Mercedes’ supremacy is expressed above all in single-lap pace. It is the second time in the history of the Circus that a team has monopolized the front row in the first three events of the year: only McLaren achieved this in 1999. If Antonelli and Russell live up to expectations in Miami as well, Mercedes will become the only team to start the championship with four consecutive front-row lockouts.
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