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Budapest Bombshell: Hamilton Rewired, 2026 Power War Ignites

Budapest bulletin: Ferrari shuffles Hamilton’s pit wall, Cadillac rolls at Silverstone, and the 2026 power game gets louder

Saturday in Budapest usually hums along on tyre talk and sector splits. Not today. Ferrari dropped a quiet hand grenade into Lewis Hamilton’s 2026 plans, Cadillac turned its first laps, Maranello let its next-generation engine sing on camera, Helmut Marko stirred the pot about Mercedes’ looming muscle, and Red Bull Powertrains spelled out where the real fight may be.

Ferrari resets Hamilton’s radio for 2026
Ferrari confirmed Lewis Hamilton will have a new race engineer from 2026, with Riccardo Adami moving into a broader role across the Driver Academy and the team’s testing programs. On paper, it’s administrative housekeeping; in reality, it’s the most intimate relationship a driver has on a race weekend changing after just one season.

Hamilton’s second year in red will start with a new voice in his ear, new rhythms on the radio, and a fresh layer of trust to build when the visor goes down. For a driver who thrived alongside the continuity of “Bono” at Mercedes, the timing is intriguing. It doesn’t scream crisis, but it does underline Ferrari’s willingness to keep reshaping interfaces around their marquee signing rather than letting the structure harden. Internal promotion for Adami signals a push to spread that experience through Maranello’s pipeline, while Hamilton gets a partner chosen with the 2026 regulations explicitly in mind.

Cadillac’s first laps: Perez turns, Bottas watches
Across at Silverstone, Cadillac logged its shakedown miles for 2026, with Sergio Perez bolting in for the maiden run and Valtteri Bottas observing from the garage. As ever with these early systems checks, nobody’s chasing lap time. But wheels turned, sensors blinked, and Perez climbed out sounding exactly how you’d expect a driver to sound after a first date with a brand-new project: fired up for more.

Symbolically, it’s a big marker. A new operation, a fresh car, and—crucially—the first public steps of a program that will be judged from day one on execution. Teams love to say “data, not drama” at this stage. Still, there’s a reason the paddock pays attention when a newcomer rolls out and everything looks tidy.

Ferrari’s 2026 power unit clears its throat
Back in Italy, Ferrari posted the fire-up of its 2026 engine and let the audio do the talking. The soundtrack inevitably launched a thousand hot takes, while whispers in the paddock point to Ferrari pursuing steel cylinder heads over aluminium in search of combustion gains. Whether “revolutionary” sticks as a fair label or just a preseason headline, the intent is obvious: efficiency and energy management will define this ruleset, and Ferrari wants to plant a flag early.

SEE ALSO:  Williams Reveals FW48 Weight, Dares Bahrain to Decide

Worth remembering: sound clips aren’t spec sheets. But the optics of Maranello’s PU firing and, on the same day, a customer outfit turning laps with it in the back, won’t hurt the mood inside the Scuderia.

Marko’s warning shot: 2026 title goes where the Mercedes PU goes
Helmut Marko couldn’t let a Saturday pass without a provocation. The longtime Red Bull power broker reckons Max Verstappen will be up against it in 2026, predicting the championship will land with a Mercedes-powered driver once the new engines arrive. It’s less a slight at Verstappen than a nod to how prepared Mercedes is perceived to be for the next era.

Marko went further, pointing out that the German manufacturer’s reach could be decisive—supplying its works team and customer outfits like McLaren, Williams and Alpine in 2026. That’s his framing, but even as a paddock whisper it carries weight. If Mercedes lands the PU sweet spot early, the competitive field tilts fast.

Red Bull Powertrains: the ICE isn’t dead, it’s the battleground
Ben Hodgkinson, the man steering Red Bull Powertrains, offered the day’s most technical—and telling—note. In a landscape obsessed with electrical deployment and energy caps, he sees the internal combustion engine returning as a true differentiator. Red Bull’s first in-house engine effort, built with Ford, has always been about control and accountability. Hodgkinson, who arrived from Mercedes HPP in 2022, is effectively saying the lap time will still come from fuel burned as much as electrons deployed, and that’s where they’re aiming to make the difference.

It’s a reminder that while 2026 is designed to be an energy management formula, the combustion side still has headroom. Whoever unlocks that window quickest won’t just win the dyno war—they’ll set the balance of power for the whole cycle.

The through line
Strip away the noise and the message is clear: the 2026 power conversation now shapes 2025 decision-making. Ferrari is aligning its people around Hamilton with the next regs in mind. Cadillac is proving it can get the basics right under the spotlight. Maranello’s PU is real enough to rumble on video. Marko is already hedging expectations by talking up Mercedes’ firepower. And Red Bull is telegraphing where it plans to win the fight.

We’re in Budapest for the here and now, but the sport is already arguing about tomorrow’s horsepower. That’s F1 in a nutshell—battles on Sunday, chess on Monday, and a brand-new rulebook looming over every radio check.

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