Mercedes deputy technical director Simone Resta has spoken openly about McLaren’s impressive Hungarian Grand Prix performance, acknowledging the scale of the challenge now facing the championship leaders.
Lando Norris delivered a dominant victory at the Hungaroring, ending Mercedes’ perfect pole position record in 2026 and securing McLaren’s first grand prix win of the season.
The performance came after McLaren bolted a redesigned floor onto the Mercedes-powered MCL40, a sizeable update that clearly had a major effect on the car’s pace through the weekend.
Resta addressed the upgrade on Mercedes’ new in-house podcast, the Nu Silver Arrows Radio Show, saying: “For sure, it’s a sizeable update and it must have had an impact on their performance.”
He was careful to also credit Norris himself, noting the gap between the two McLaren drivers was significant and pointing to the Briton’s strong form throughout the season.
Resta added: “We have seen some strong performances from Norris already every time this year, and maybe he was in a very good place with the car and the set-up in these conditions and tyre management and he executed very well.”
Mercedes began the 2026 season in dominant fashion, winning each of the opening six grands prix from pole position, but Ferrari and McLaren have since both broken through with the help of major upgrade packages.
Ferrari has been particularly aggressive in closing the gap, recouping 26 points over the last three weekends to leave them 72 points behind championship-leading Mercedes heading into the summer break.
Despite the radical new chassis and power unit regulations introduced for 2026, Resta admitted the tightening of competition was broadly anticipated by the team before the season began.
“Clearly, you only start the season with question marks about potential other contenders, but actually it panned out as we expected,” he said.
Resta welcomed the fluctuating performance levels across different teams, suggesting the varied upgrade timelines were adding an extra layer of intrigue to the championship battle.
“It’s nice to see some fluctuation of performance, which I guess is making the racing quite more interesting,” the Italian added.
Mercedes’ own campaign has been complicated by ongoing power unit problems and reliability issues that have cost the team significant points across the first half of the season.
Resta vowed the Silver Arrows would tackle those problems with “relentless effort,” insisting the team had the experience, processes, and tools needed to work through each issue systematically.
“Nothing emotional, just simply rationally analyse all of them, make sure we have the right fix at the right time and speed up this process,” he said, adding: “We’ll be a better team after we sort out all of this.”
Deputy team principal Bradley Lord also addressed Mercedes’ upgrade strategy for the second half of 2026, revealing internal discussions were underway about when and where to introduce new performance packages.
“When do we bring the performance that’s in the wind tunnel or working its way through the factory at the moment?” Lord said, highlighting the importance of careful timing and not overreaching too quickly.