The 2026 season started under the desert lights at the Bahrain International Circuit, and Max delivered exactly what Red Bull needed after a turbulent winter testing period. Pole on Saturday by 0.187s over Norris, then a controlled lights-to-flag run to take the 25 points and bonus for fastest lap on the final tour.

Strategy

Soft–hard–medium was the optimal call given the track temperature climbing through the second stint. Red Bull pulled the trigger on the first stop a lap earlier than McLaren and that gave Max the undercut that defined the rest of the race. The hard compound held up better than expected — Pirelli’s revised construction for 2026 seems to have killed the graining that plagued last year’s opening round.

McLaren’s last two seasons have been a slow-motion turnaround. From 2022’s slow start to 2025’s championship contention. There are several reasons this happened, and most of them have nothing to do with the car.

Wind tunnel

The MTC opened a new full-scale wind tunnel in late 2023. Before that, McLaren had been using the Toyota Cologne facility on a contract basis — which meant limited tunnel time and travel costs eating budget. Owning their tunnel changed everything: more correlation runs, faster development cycle, better confidence in design decisions.

Red Bull launched the RB22 in early February. Visually it’s an evolution of the RB21, but there are several details worth highlighting.

Sidepods

The biggest visual change. The inlet has moved up and inward — closer to the cockpit — and the undercut has been deepened. This follows the philosophy that started with the RB18: cleaner airflow to the floor edge, more energy in the diffuser.

I think they’ve gone slightly more extreme than McLaren this year, which is a reversal of last year’s trend.

Three days of testing in Bahrain. Here’s what looked real and what was sandbagging.

Mileage leaders

McLaren’s reliability on a brand-new car is notable. They’ve clearly done their homework on the dyno. Aston Martin had a visibly difficult test — the new chassis kept stopping for software resets.

The 2026 regulations have been talked about for two years, and now we finally have running cars. Here’s a clean-headed look at what really changed and what stayed the same.

Power unit

This is where the real revolution happened. The internal combustion engine has been heavily simplified — no MGU-H anymore, which was always the most complex and expensive component. The MGU-K is now responsible for nearly 50% of total power output, up from about 20% under 2014–2025 rules.