Kimi Antonelli left Hungary with a 50-point championship lead over Lewis Hamilton and a title race that no longer looks like anyone else’s to win. Max Verstappen, the four-time world champion who dominated the previous rulebook, is sixth.
Speaking on the Drive to Wynn podcast, the former Haas team principal offered a diagnosis that has less to do with cars than with muscle memory.
“The key factor for me is how the young drivers adapted to this. You see all of the young drivers, they adapted better than the seasoned drivers.”
His argument is that the 2026 rulebook has stripped out almost everything drivers had built their instincts around.
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Habits are the problem
New chassis, new aerodynamics, and a power unit split roughly evenly between the internal combustion engine and its electric component, which forces drivers to lift on the straights to recharge. In Steiner’s reading, veterans are having to unpick years of ground-effect reflexes on the fly.
“If you have driven the ground effect cars for five years, it is not that you can change from one day to the next.”
Antonelli, in his second season alongside George Russell at Mercedes, is Steiner’s exhibit A.
“Kimi has no old habits, while George has to get rid of some habits.”
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Russell was widely tipped as pre-season favourite. Instead, he sits third in the standings after Hungary, behind Hamilton and behind his own younger team-mate.
From PlayStation to the next iteration
Steiner drew a longer arc through the generational shifts he has watched from the paddock.
“When Max and his generation came in, they were called the PlayStation drivers.”
The regulations have already handed the sport’s only 2026 rookie a debut to remember. Arvid Lindblad, 18, scored points on his first F1 start for Racing Bulls in Australia, finishing eighth after starting ninth.
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Verstappen, meanwhile, has made no secret of his frustration with the new rules, telling reporters ahead of the season opener in Melbourne that it was already too late for the tweaks some rivals were pushing for.
“We’re a bit late with that. The amount of money that has been invested into these regulations, it will be around for a while.”
Antonelli has six wins, six poles and nine podiums; Mercedes lead the constructors’ championship by 72 points from Ferrari, according to standings tracked after the Hungarian Grand Prix.
The next chance to widen or close that gap comes at the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort on 23 August.
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