F1 pre-season testing: McLaren & Red Bull release images of 2026 cars
Seven of 11 teams competed on Monday; Red Bull, Mercedes, Racing Bulls, Haas, Alpine and the new Audi and Cadillac teams.
McLaren announced last week that they would not take their cars to the track after the first day as they tried to maximize the design time. Ferrari announced that it would not participate in the race on Monday after the first test at its factory last week.
Aston Martin has said its new cars won’t be ready until Thursday, and Williams will miss the test entirely due to delays in design and production schedules.
No deadline was given and all teams encountered at least some technical issues as they learned about their new cars.
Rival teams were impressed with the amount of mileage they achieved, considering it was the first full day the two Red Bull teams had run with their new in-house engines, developed together with new partner Ford.
Before testing started, McLaren and Red Bull released photos of their 2026 cars for the first time.
McLaren, which doubled its drivers’ and constructors’ championships last year for the first time since 1998, showed off its car in a one-off test livery this week.
Red Bull showed studio shots of its cars carefully selected to hide key design features.
Russell added: “We were pleased with our day but I was also impressed by a lot of the other teams.
“The Red Bull power unit has completed a large number of laps and, given that this is the first engine they have produced, it clearly means they have done a good job.”
“Haas has also managed to run a similar amount to us, so the Ferrari power unit has also covered a lot of kilometers. Not like in 2014! The sport has developed a lot since then and the level is very high in every respect.”
Audi has taken over the Sauber team for the German car company’s first entry into F1. They had a reliability issue that prevented Bortoleto from driving in the afternoon.
Team principal Jonathan Wheatley said: “We had a technical issue, we recognized that and decided to shut down the car. We’ve done a lot of testing this year and wanted to really understand the issues, see what the weather conditions were and decide whether we were going to run tomorrow.”
Rain is forecast for the second day of testing on Tuesday, during which teams are allowed to run on a maximum of three days available.
Bortoleto said: “The cars are very different. I feel these will be slower, but it’s nice that the power unit is 50% electric; you come out of the corner and you have a lot of speed and you can see how powerful the engine is.”
“You have to adapt, but it’s still a race car.”
Racing Bulls’ Lawson said: “[The car is] The ride is very different and I haven’t quite gotten my head around it yet. We will continue to learn. It seems like there’s a lot more we can do as drivers to potentially make a difference, but right now it’s too early. For now it’s very difficult to know where we are when we’re just trying to optimize the tool.
“[The power unit] It feels good. However, this is very difficult to say; What really matters now is reliability.
“We did a lot of laps today and the only problems we had today were safety precautions, not real problems. But it’s hard to know where we are compared to others.”
