F1 Social

F1 fans go wild over 'white smoke' testing rumour at Barcelona

Sam Cook Friday 30 January 2026 22:49

F1 fans on social media have been thinking up their own conspiracy theories, after it was reported that white smoke was seen from the pit lane in Barcelona.

F1 is in Barcelona this week for a five-day private shakedown at the former home of the Spanish Grand Prix, the first five of 11 days that have been scheduled by F1 with the regulations overhaul in mind.

10 of the 11 teams set to be on the grid in 2026 have been trying to get in as many laps as possible to help with their preparations for the 2026 season, although Williams opted to miss the test with their FW48 not yet ready to head out on track.

The week has seen a number of different drivers top the timesheets, although these lap times are only reported, with no official timings being released by F1 themselves due to the private nature of the shakedown.

Isack Hadjar reportedly topped day one, before day two saw just Red Bull and Ferrari running, and day three saw Lando Norris top the timesheets. Mercedes' brilliant week of testing then continued on day four, with George Russell putting in the fastest time of the week's running.

But on Thursday, it was something else that caught the eye of F1 fans. There were reports circulating that white smoke had been seen pouring from the pit lane at the track, and this led to lots of jokes on social media about a Vatican-style election.

"Red Bull have elected a new second driver," one user said, before another replied that it was too early for that just yet: "Nah that happens AFTER Monaco."

"New pope already?," one user questioned, before another said: "That’s Ferrari electing the new pope."

One social media user even joked it could be Ferrari's new way of communicating to their drivers following Riccardo Adami's axing as Lewis Hamilton's race engineer, saying: "Was it Ferrari testing their new strategy communication method?"

Limited reliability issues at F1 shakedown

The cause of the reported white smoke was not confirmed, and while it would make sense to have come from one of the cars, reliability has been pretty good on the whole for all of the teams present in Barcelona.

This has come as quite a surprise, with the comprehensive regulation changes being predicted before the shakedown to cause a fair amount of issues in the early weeks, particularly with the power units changing so much.

But while Aston Martin and McLaren struggled on Thursday and Audi on Monday, all of the teams did manage to get at least one full day when their car was running and putting in the mileage.

Time will tell whether this strong reliability across the board remains the case when we head to Australia in March, with six more days of testing available for teams between now and then.

F1 Red Bull Isack Hadjar pre-season testing