Lewis Hamilton's LIGHTNING F1 start blitzes rivals and makes Ferrari unstoppable

Lewis Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton's LIGHTNING F1 start blitzes rivals and makes Ferrari unstoppable

Ferrari could be unstoppable

Sheona Mountford F1 Journalist

Motorsport journalist working in F1 since 2024.

Thursday 19 February 2026 20:27

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Lewis Hamilton's rocketship speed trounced his F1 rivals during the second day of testing in Bahrain and Ferrari could become unstoppable.

The seven-time champion enjoyed full-rein over the SF-26 on Thursday, where he drove the Ferrari in both the morning and afternoon session.

Hamilton's morning was cut short however, when a 'small issue' forced Hamilton to return to the garage, where he remained for nearly three hours and only completed five laps.

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Nevertheless, Hamilton was out again in the afternoon and while he didn't manage to complete a full race simulation, he still accumulated more mileage and even produced race runs that were in the 1:36s.

The Ferrari star finished day two of testing fourth fastest, with a best time of 1:33.408, but it wasn't his times that caught attention in Bahrain.

Ferrari's start advantage

As the drivers assembled on the grid at the end of the day on Thursday, they all attempted a race start and Ferrari were mightily impressive.

Nine places behind the lead car, Hamilton rocketed into the lead by the time he swept through the first corner, confirming the superiority of the Ferrari engine in regards to the start procedure.

The F1 race start procedure has been another controversial topic in the build up to the 2026 season, with most of the new cars struggling to get off the start line.

At the first practice start in Bahrain last week, only two cars got off the line as the new power units mean that some cars need to rev up hard for an extended period to jump the line properly.

This was a problem teams were well aware of last year, so much so that Ferrari have designed their power unit to work around this issue and even reportedly blocked a change to the start procedure.

Amid safety concerns, this week the FIA have trialled a longer start procedure where drivers received an additional five seconds between the last car lining up on the grid and the start light sequence.

This helped those at the back of the grid to spool their turbos by revving the engine and has, so far, gone ahead without any major issues. Nevertheless, despite the amended start procedure it is clear Ferrari maintain an advantage on the starts, which could be pretty handy come Melbourne.

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