2026 British Grand Prix post-race press conference transcript

DRIVERS

1 – Charles LECLERC (Ferrari)
2 – George RUSSELL (Mercedes)
3 – Lewis HAMILTON (Ferrari)

TRACK INTERVIEWS (Conducted by Jenson Button) 

Q: Charles, you just won the British Grand Prix. How’s that feel?

Charles LECLERC: Yeah, it feels incredible. I mean, unfortunately the end was maybe not the one I would have dreamt of, but to win after the last few weekends that have been particularly difficult, all the work that we put into trying to get the feeling back in the car, I felt like I had found something yesterday between the Sprint race and qualifying, but I had to confirm that today and today the feeling was back where it needs to be. So, I’m so incredibly happy.

Q: It’s been quite an emotional year for you, a few incidents, obviously Monaco, Barcelona in qualifying, so it’s kind of getting a monkey off your back. It looks like you’ve had a reset and you’ve come out fighting this weekend.

CL: Yeah, exactly. As you said, after Monaco, the feeling wasn’t there. I crashed in Q3, then in the race we had an issue and that ended our race. Then Saturday in Barcelona the feeling was good, but then I crashed again, so that was very difficult mentally. And then on Sunday we had an issue with the car, and Austria wasn’t so great. But here we managed to put everything together and I really hope I can keep that momentum going forward. But a huge thank you to the team for having worked so hard.

Q: George, not the most straightforward race for you out there, but must be pretty happy to come away with second on the podium.

George RUSSELL: Yeah, I mean, firstly, congrats to Charles. He drove a great race. Great to be here, always, in Silverstone. My first podium, so really pleased to be standing here, even though, obviously, very lucky race. Got the puncture, then got very lucky at the end with the Safety Car. I mean, it would have been great for the fans for it to have restarted. From my side, my tyres were cold, so I was kind of glad to just bring it home in second.

Q: Tough weekend, but overall good to be standing here. Why do you think that was for you this weekend, your pace not being quite where you wanted it to?

GR: I don’t know, to be honest. I mean, qualifying, we had some straight-line speed issues. I don’t know if it was there still in the race. But anyway, I’m going to keep pushing, my team are going to keep pushing. These Ferrari guys look really quick. So, yeah, game on.

Q: I’m with you as well. I wouldn’t have wanted the restart with this guy behind you. Lewis, I’m sure it’s a bit bittersweet. Home Grand Prix, you stood on the podium, obviously wanted the top step and it didn’t go your way at the end with putting the new tyres on. But listen to that crowd.

Lewis HAMILTON: Yeah, well firstly I have to big congratulations to Charles. Winning at this Grand Prix is such a special experience and this is a great result for our team, so congratulations to our team. Yeah, I just didn’t have it today. I jumped the start, already got a five-second penalty, but Charles had the pace on me today. I struggled with the balance of the car, but I gave it everything and I’m grateful to be up here.

Q: Yeah, watching the race, you were fighting hard with George and Max, but it must be promising for you to see Charles’ pace and your pace in the race. Can you take the fight to these guys, Mercedes?

LH: I mean, it looks like it. I’m not really sure what happened to Kimi, but yeah, it looks like it. I mean, the team’s doing a phenomenal job, so we have some work still to do to really close the gap on pure performance. But look at these results, you know, two wins for the team this year. This is just fantastic.

Q: Congratulations. Charles, we’ll finish with you. That wasn’t the most straightforward race either, was it? Kimi was there pushing you all the way, obviously had his issue, which helped you a little bit, and then the Safety Car at the end. You must be thinking, what do I need to do?

CL: Yeah, I mean, with Kimi, it would have been close. He was very fast when he was coming towards me, so it would have been very difficult to keep that first place. Then I heard he had a problem, so I was like, “OK, now I have quite a big gap and it should be straightforward.” But then the Safety Car at the end and for whatever reason, I think some backmarkers had to pass us, so I did all the Safety Car time at like 100, 120 kph. My tyres were completely cold, so I was very sceptical about the restart. But yeah, it’s not great for the fans that are here around the track. In the helmet, I was kind of happy that there was not a restart to keep that win. It feels really good.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Very well done, Charles. Brilliant race, and it had been a while, 624 days. What does this one mean to you?

CL: It means a lot. It means a lot because when things get tough, and that's literally the situation I've been in the last few races, obviously there's a lot of negativity around me in general, with narratives being created, and it's never a nice environment to work in. But to keep our head down and to keep working very hard and get the result that we got today, I'm super proud of the whole team that have been pushing me and helping me to find that feeling again with the car. As I said, it's only a first step and I've got to prove that on multiple track layouts. But on such a track where confidence is key, I wouldn't have been able to do that without the feeling, and so that's really good.

Q: And of course, this makes up for what happened here in 2021 as well, when you led for most of the race.

CL: Yeah, I didn't really think about that when I was in the car, but yeah, I don't know if it made up for it, but yeah, it feels very good.

Q: Now, you took the lead at the start of the race and never looked back. Just talk us through those early stages, if you could.

CL: Yeah, I mean, we had a very strong start, which wasn't a given because yesterday the start was very poor. So that was a point of focus. After that, I just tried to manage my tyres, focus on the feeling I had with the car from qualifying. I knew what to do inside the car, I knew what to change in terms of tools that I have on my steering wheel. Yeah, I just felt very comfortable in the car, especially in the first stint. So yeah, then I understood that the win was a possibility. It was going to be tricky with Kimi at the end, so we've been a little bit lucky on that, but we also need that sometimes.

Q: Well, you do. And Ferrari have now won two of the last three races. Do you feel you have a car now where you can take the fight to the Mercedes at every race?

CL: Well, I think it's too early to say. I think this weekend was a particularly big surprise for the whole team. Not the win today, just the overall performance. I mean, we were a lot faster than what we thought, and I think as much as we need to analyse when things are going a lot worse than expected, we also need to analyse when things go a lot better than expected. Coming into the weekend, I remember the meetings that we've done on Thursday and we kind of thought we would be six tenths, five tenths off, minimum. Yeah, and we were much better than that, and we actually won today. So yeah, it's a very special feeling.

Q: Alright. Very well done to you. Thank you. Charles. George, let's come to you. That looked like an emotional rollercoaster for you out there. Your first podium here at Silverstone. Just how sweet was the end result?

GR: I don't really know how to sum it up, to be honest, because it's been a very challenging weekend. Things within my control not good enough, things outside of my control haven't been good enough, which has all resulted in poor pace. And then in the race, I was having a great battle with Max and Lewis, going against two of the greatest of all time, and I felt I could have passed Max. And with the straight-line speed over the Ferraris, I felt I could have held off Lewis as well. So P3 was probably a fair and would have been a good result behind Charles and Kimi. Then the puncture, I just couldn't believe my luck. I've gone beyond sort of anger and frustration now. And then if you told me I'm going to end up P2, I wouldn't have even comprehended how that was possible. So, I'm very grateful to have stood up on the podium.

Q: And in terms of the feeling that you've got from the car this weekend, better or worse than Austria last week?

GR: Well, the feeling was good, but the lap times were slow. And as I said, there were things outside of my control that contributed a lot towards that, and things in my control. I'm still struggling to understand this car. I probably still leave this weekend, albeit extremely grateful to stand on the podium, I leave less satisfied than probably Canada, when I broke down from the lead. And if I want to fight for the championship, the performances need to be better. I need to be better. I need to be working better with my team. We need to be maximising everything. We've got a close fight now with Ferrari, so it's not just Kimi and I, Lewis is still very close. It needs to be improved.

Q: You say it's a close fight in the championship. Just how seriously do you take the threat from Ferrari now?

GR: I'm not even thinking about it, to be honest, because I've got my own things I need to deal with and improve upon on my own side. I left Monaco three races ago 68 points behind and I leave here 25 points behind. So yeah, I would take it, but it won't continue like that forever unless the results, the performance, gets better.

Q: OK, George, thank you for that. And Lewis, let's come to you now. Your 16th podium here at Silverstone, it's an extraordinary record. How do you reflect on the race, though?

LH: Yeah, not that great. Charles did a mega job today, fully deserves the win. From my side, pretty bad from the get-go. I jumped the start, which I have done very few times in the 380-odd races that I've done. And then just balance-wise, I noticed Charles went up on his balance, I think compared to qualifying, added more wing, and I felt the car was really oversteer with the diff settings that we had had. And so, I took out wing and then I had the biggest understeer at the beginning of the race. So, he just pulled away from me. I just couldn't even turn the car until halfway kind of through that first stint, I managed to start turning the car a little bit better with some diff changes, but by then the gap was already huge. And then the five-second at the stop, and then there's just one thing after the other.

Q: As you say, it's very unlikely for you to jump the start. What actually happened as the lights were going out?

LH: I just, yeah, my hand just moved just like that. Don't really know where it went. I didn't mean to do it. I didn't even tell my hand to do it. But anyway, it happens.

Q: Look, just at the end with the Safety Car, the yellow flag, what can you tell us about that, or just what happened when the Safety Car came?

LH: I literally just got past Max. So, I’d come through Turn 9 and I was literally staring in the mirror because I was thinking he's going to come in a bit like George coming back past me, and that's where I was looking, and I didn’t see the flag. So that's why later on, if you hear the radio, later on I asked if there was a yellow flag, because I didn't see one. Yeah, that was it.

Q: Clearly you're frustrated, we understand that. But what positives do you take from the weekend here at Silverstone in terms of your pace, Ferrari's pace?

LH: I mean, it's amazing. It's amazing to see the pace that we've had this weekend at this sort of circuit. We definitely didn't anticipate it. So just phenomenal to be strong weekend as a team and come away with really good points is really, really special. And a big, huge thanks to the team.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Luke Smith – The Athletic) Charles, a question for you. To your right. You talked about the narratives that you felt have been there in the past couple of weeks. Could you talk a little bit about that and how do you handle that? Does it become fuel for you to kind of prove things wrong? Carlos in the pen said he's always admired your ability to bounce-back and how you do sort of respond to setbacks in this way.

CL: Well, I don't know if it fuels me. Honestly, I think anybody that says that would lie. I think whenever there's so much negativity around, it's not something so nice to see. So no, I mean, you try to cancel the noise as much as possible. I try to not look at my phone and focus on what is relevant and in order to also have the right picture of the situation, because things are said and you go from hero to zero, from zero to hero, in like two days in this sport, and so it can influence then the way you see a situation. So no, my job was really to just try and cancel that noise, to not look at anything, to not listen to anything.

And I know that I didn't become a bad driver from one day to the other. It was just a matter of finding that feeling with the car. These cars are very specific, are very different to the way we've been driving since we started racing, and so it takes a bit more time to get used to it. I was very strong for the first part of the season, then I lost a bit of feeling with the car. We changed quite a few things with the car and it took a bit more time than what I had wished to get back to the level I wanted. And on top of that, we've had some issues on the Sunday that cost me quite a lot of points.

So altogether, it wasn't a nice situation to be in, but I'm very happy to get out of this situation in this way. However, as I said, it's still the beginning. It's only one race and I must not get carried away thinking that the war is over. I mean, the battle with this car has been quite a lot recently and I cannot take it for granted that now it's behind me. So, I'll keep working and try to get that feeling more often going ahead.

Q: (Ed Hardy – Autosport) Question for George. Start of the season, you had quite a lot of bad luck and it all combined to give Kimi quite a big points advantage. But after his retirement in Barcelona and now the issue he had here, would you say things have balanced out between the pair of you?

GR: Whether the luck has balanced out or not, I'm not sure. However, based on my performances and based on his performances over the course of these nine races, I think probably a 25-point gap is in his favour, is probably correct. He has done a better job than me this year to this point, so he deserves to be ahead of me. Whether it should be 25 points, whether it should be 10 points, whether it should be 35 points is a debate, but in that ballpark between, you know, I obviously lost 15 points as well in Monaco with the drive-through penalty. I think anywhere from 10 to 30 points behind is probably about fair.

Q: (Graham Harris – MotorsportMonday.com) A question for Lewis. Do you regret taking the pit stop and getting the tyres? Just with the Safety Car, do you think you should have stayed out, kept second?

LH: What difference does it make?

Q: (Graham Harris – MotorsportMonday.com) Three points.

LH: Yeah, of course. I mean, the team asked me to stop. I assumed in stopping that we would be holding position. If they told me, "You're stopping and you're losing position," I wouldn't have done it.

Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) I guess this question is to Lewis and George as the British drivers, but obviously the race finished behind the Safety Car. There was quite a bad reaction from the crowd, quite a few boos. It looks as though we were going to get the race going and then we didn't. So how disappointing, I guess, was that from your perspective? And I guess particularly from you, Lewis, as you mentioned there that you put on the new tyres to hopefully have a good restart.

GR: I mean, of course it's a shame for any race to finish into the Safety Car. But then you go back to Abu Dhabi ’21, and that is just how racing goes. Nobody can plan for somebody to have an incident, and the way F1 deal with it and FIA deal with it shouldn't be any different at the end of the race compared to the start of the race. Obviously, there was a lot of chat post-Abu Dhabi ’21. If you actually look at the number of races that have finished under the Safety Car over the past 20 years, it's not actually a lot. So, as I said, it is a shame, but what can you do? I don't think it should be different.

LH: Yeah, same as George said. Not really much more to add.

Q: (Dan Wilson – Global) A question to Lewis. Lewis, you're 32 points behind Kimi now in the championship. Mercedes have had some bad luck, some reliability issues. Ferrari have actually had very good reliability. How impressed have you been both with that and actually the way that Ferrari seem to be executing races at the moment?

LH: Massively impressed. I think we came into the season knowing that we needed to level up in our processes and just how we executed on race weekends. That's something that we were pushing for last year. And then the team's really, every single individual brings so much to the table and is bringing the best to the table. The guys in the garage worked so hard for the pit stops. We've got great pit stops. And then everyone back in the factory has worked so hard to bring this consistency, and that's really what I think ultimately is going to make the difference this year.

You're seeing engines in general have had more issues this year than they normally would have, and don't know what the situation with on the battery side of this for George and for Kimi, but at some point there must be a penalty, I would imagine, in the sense that we only have two battery cells or something like that. But it's going to be key for us just holding onto this, maximising the points, executing to the best of our ability, even when it's the case that we can't win.

Q: (David Fioux – L’Equipe) Charles, how is it possible, here on your right, how is it possible for things to change so much on a car? Yesterday you've talked about philosophical matters on your car. But as far as I'm concerned, I don't know that philosophy can make a car go any faster.

CL: Yeah, I mean, when I say philosophical, it's more about small details that just fit my driving a little bit better in a particular phase of the corner. I don't want to go too much into detail there. But it's just a few things that I saw on the data on Friday night and I was like, "OK, that might be things that just don't fit with my driving style." And we changed those few things from sprint race to qualifying and that was a lot better. So yeah, I was very proud of the work we've done to see that because I think this kind of change is not really so black and white. You just don't look at data and say, "My God, OK, this is what we need to change." It's intuition mixed with feeling. Then we went for it and it was actually a very successful direction for me. I was very happy.

Q: (Louis Bollard – Sporting Life) A question for Lewis and Charles. Does this weekend give you confidence that you'd be able to fight for the win in Spa in two weeks' time, given the worries you've had with Ferrari coming into this weekend?

CL: Personally, I don't really focus on that. I think where I'll be focusing on is just to try and get that feeling again in the car. If I have that feeling in the car, I'm confident that I will extract the maximum out of this car. If I don't, then it might be more tricky. But then the overall result, of course, we are pushing extremely hard as a team in order to fight and challenge Mercedes. We were expecting a very difficult weekend here in Silverstone. I think prior to this weekend, we were expecting even more of a difficult weekend in Spa. Considering we obviously won today, maybe we are a bit closer than what we initially thought.

But it's still to be proven, and for that we also need to understand why was it an outstandingly good weekend compared to our expectations. So, we'll focus on all that. But personally, I won't be focusing on just winning because that will be the wrong approach. I'll just focus on the process in order to get the best feeling and to maximise this car.

LH: Spa. I mean, up until now, we really have been making such great progress. And what gives me confidence is coming into this weekend, the simulator said that we should start in a much different place with the set-up, and my engineers and I decided to stay within the direction that we would normally go. Charles started the way it was, but the sim would say to go, and then ended up my philosophy and the direction that I was taking was ultimately the right one, and he migrated that way. It's good to see that direction that I have pushed for is paying off and that we've just got to continue to make changes and continue to push. We've got to continue to bring upgrades. Spa is going to be long straights, but ultimately, I've got to do a better job than I did this weekend.

ENDS