F1 Barcelona: Ferrari superstar overcomes rain pain for a brilliant first victory in red

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F1 superstar seals first Ferrari win in Barcelona downpour

Best first Ferrari win ever?

Dan Ripley Global Editor

Professional F1 journalist and analyst

Saturday 13 June 2026 08:29

Lewis Hamilton has the bit between his teeth for Ferrari having become the official chief rival to Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli in the Formula 1 title fight after a great start to the season.

The seven-time world champion moved into second place in the championship after taking his third podium of the season at the Monaco Grand Prix, matching his second place from Canada having also secured a third in China.

Three podiums in the first six races of 2026 is a stark contrast to the zero in the whole of 2025 and they leave Hamilton now targeting his first Ferrari win in the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix (formerly the Spanish GP).

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The 41-year-old will be in good company if he does grab his first victory in red at this track, as that is exactly what a fellow seven-time world champion did 30 years ago.

Michael Schumacher joined Ferrari for 1996, and the team were a shambles having only won two races in the previous five seasons. The German may have been the double world champion, but nobody was expecting him to record three straight titles in 1996. And they were right.

Williams dominated 1996 the season with drivers Damon Hill and Jacques Villeneuve fighting for the world championship until the final round in Suzuka, but the secondary story was Schumacher bringing some pride back to Ferrari, and that all started with one of his best ever wins at the Spanish Grand Prix.

As was always the case in 1996, Hill was on the front row after taking pole in front of Villeneuve, nearly a second quicker than Schumacher.

The pain of rain in Spain

Like the Monaco Grand Prix two weeks earlier though, a highly unusual downpour hit the track on race day, and like Monaco, Schumacher had a terrible start due to clutch issues, ending the first lap down in sixth. His misfortune triggered incidents behind him which resulted in McLaren's David Coulthard, the Ligier of Olivier Panis, the Footwork of Ricardo Rosset as well as both Minardis of Giancarlo Fisichella and Pedro Lamy all tumbling out on lap one.

Conditions were treacherous - Villeneuve and Jean Alesi's Benetton had passed Hill and he joined fellow Brits in the Ferrari of Eddie Irvine and the Sauber of Johnny Herbert in running off the track in the opening five laps.... before then spinning off track again on lap eight.

Up front Villeneuve was still leading from Alesi close behind, but Schumacher was making inroads on the pair of them having climbed to third. The Ferrari driver had so much more confidence on the track, exploring the karting lines around the outside to find grip, allowing him to send one on the inside of Alesi's car heading into turn five at SEAT.

Michael Schumacher passes Jacques Villeneuve for the lead

Schumacher takes control

A dizzy Hill spun again on lap 10 but this time it was into a wall, damaging his front suspension and putting him out of the race from eighth. Probably for the best. But it wasn't all bad news for Hill's world championship as moments later Schumacher got past Villeneuve to lead, exactly how he had passed Alesi, before deciding to absolutely embarrass the entire grid.

With the rain still falling, Schumacher pitted on lap 24, with his best lap of 1:45.517 nearly four seconds quicker than the second-placed Villeneuve's. His preceding lap before pitting was a 1:48.420 compared with Villeneuve's 1:51.495. He was lapping over three seconds a lap faster than his nearest rival, building up a 37-second lead. After the first round of pit stops, he was lapping four seconds a lap faster...

Schumacher never looked back. Behind him, Alesi jumped Villeneuve in the pits late on for second but with many cars spinning off only six drivers finished. Rubens Barrichello had looked strong to battle for a podium in his Jordan only for his clutch to fail.

That left Heinz-Harald Frentzen's Sauber, Mika Hakkinen's McLaren and Ligier's Pedro Diniz to round out the top six and for the latter to score his first ever F1 point.

Schumacher's lead at one point was nearly a minute over Alesi, but as he eased off near the end it dropped to 45 seconds as he crossed the line to win. The F1 world was in awe of Schumacher's display, as was the German himself. He was stunned at Ferrari's performance in the wet given the team's issues earlier in the season.

Jean Alesi pours champagne on Ferrari boss Jean Todt and Michael Schumacher

1996 Spanish Grand Prix Results
Position	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired
1	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari	65	1:59:49.307
2	Jean Alesi	Benetton Renault	65	+45.302s
3	Jacques Villeneuve	Williams Renault	65	+48.388s
4	Heinz-Harald Frentzen	Sauber Ford	64	+1 lap
5	Mika Hakkinen	McLaren Mercedes	64	+1 lap
6	Pedro Diniz	Ligier Mugen Honda	63	+2 laps
NC	Jos Verstappen	Footwork Hart	47	DNF
NC	Rubens Barrichello	Jordan Peugeot	45	DNF
NC	Gerhard Berger	Benetton Renault	44	DNF
NC	Johnny Herbert	Sauber Ford	20	DNF
NC	Martin Brundle	Jordan Peugeot	17	DNF
NC	Mika Salo	Tyrrell Yamaha	16	DNF
NC	Damon Hill	Williams Renault	10	DNF
NC	Ukyo Katayama	Tyrrell Yamaha	8	DNF
NC	Eddie Irvine	Ferrari	1	DNF
NC	Olivier Panis	Ligier Mugen Honda	1	DNF
NC	Giancarlo Fisichella	Minardi Ford	1	DNF
NC	David Coulthard	McLaren Mercedes	0	DNF
NC	Ricardo Rosset	Footwork Hart	0	DNF
NC	Pedro Lamy	Minardi Ford	0	DNF

Hamilton looking to follow Schumacher

He said after the race: "It's amazing, if anyone would have asked me how much I would bet on this, I wouldn't have even bet a penny on it, because after qualifying we were nowhere in comparison to Williams, and even in the rain, after Brazil, Monaco, the car didn't feel good, so I wasn't expecting anything good from this weather condition.

"But when I went out in warm up the car was ending well, and I was very surprised about that, and in the race I think we have not got a present from anyone, I just pushed it to the victory, and the car has been superb, especially at the beginning, and I was able to do the job."

Granted, there is no rain forecast in Barcelona this weekend to help level the playing field at Ferrari for Hamilton, but neither does he have a one second deficit to the front runners that Schumacher had.

The Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix represents a glorious opportunity for Hamilton to repeat the achievement of an F1 and Ferrari legend and unlike Schumacher this could be the real start of his title fight.

Written by

Dan Ripley - Global Editor

I've been a massive F1 fan since the mid 1990s and continue to study the history of the sport long before that. As an experienced motor sport reporter covering F1, MotoGP and the LeMans 24 Hour race, being part of GPFans has allowed me to work with a diverse team with all sorts of different backgrounds in watching the sport and given me a greater appreciation of F1.

View full biography

F1 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari Michael Schumacher Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya Barcelona-Catalunya Grand prix