Another year of F1 awaits, and another year of wild opinion and bold predictions will be served up over the next few weeks or so by so many people, most of them pretenders, but no one does it better than our resident sporting prediction guru Tipstradamus, and he’s here to offer up this year’s serving of Tipstradamus’ Bold 2026 F1 Season Predictions.
Our resident sports-sayer Tipstradamus otherwise known as Gregstradamus is wheeled out only once a year, from a subterranean abode somewhere in the Great Dividing Range shaped like the Space City Shopping Centre in Kallangur that has a TV room with a 360 degree array of televisions showing eight different Retro Formula One races on YouTube, all with Murray Walker commentary.
Tipstradamus has harnessed the knowledge of watching every race from 1978 as well as his super natural sporting insights to come up with the below Bold 2026 F1 Season Predictions.
Where possible, we’ve got AI aka Grok to imagine some of the scenarios.
Tipstradamus’ Bold 2026 F1 Season Predictions
MAX VERSTAPPEN AND GEORGE RUSSELL WILL FIGHT OUT THE MOST BITTER TITLE FIGHT IN YEARS – AND IT WILL END IN FISTICUFFS AT THE QATAR GRAND PRIX
It seems that the new regulations for F1 in 2026 might favour Mercedes and given the form of George Russell in 2025 in an inferior car, he will be one of the big chances for Championship glory in 2026. Also given the Red Bull car in 2025 was barely faster than a wheelbarrow in the hands of non-Verstappen drivers in 2025, yet somehow Max Verstappen came within a brainfade of winning the 2025 title, he will be at the front again in 2026.
It also seems that the two drivers don’t like each other much. Maybe that’s media hype or maybe it is genuine. We boldly predict the latter, and this Championship tussle will be twice as bitter as the Verstappen-Hamilton rivalry of the early 2020’s. There will be clashes and crashes throughout the season, and will culminate in another crash on the first lap of the Qatar Grand Prix, and the two drivers will have had enough of each other by this stage and punch on at the side of the track for the world’s amusement.
OLIVER BEARMAN WILL END TWO CAREERS BY THE END OF 2026
First of all will be Esteban Ocon, who will be thrashed by the young Brit in 2026, to such an extent that Ocon will be replaced before the end of the season. And with the rivalry between the two American teams growing throughout 2026, and Haas getting a sniff that they might throw Colton Herta into a 2027 Cadillac, Haas will go for Jak Crawford to fill in for the last races of the season, starting with the US GP in Austin.
The second career will be Lewis Hamilton’s, as Ferrari realise they may as well pay a tenth of the salary to a driver that ends up more capable in a Ferrari than Hamilton has turned out to be.
VALTTERI BOTTAS WILL END UP HOSTING A LATE NIGHT SHOW
Valtteri Bottas’ change from dullest man on earth to highly amusing social media content creator will go up a notch in 2026 as he starts his first season for the US based Cadillac team. American will grow to Bottas’ style, especially his choice of patriotic American swimming wear.
Whilst the 2026 F1 season will be a mild Nottas-style disappointment mostly with flashes of Bottas-style speed, he will be picked up in the off season and given a very late night slot. Whilst the initials episodes look like the McBain talk show from The Simpsons, US audiences warm to Bottas, including President Trump, until he finds out that Finland is not a US state and is deported to Austria by ICE, as they are unable to determine the difference between Austria and Australia, where he spends his summers.
LANCE STROLL WILL FAIL TO QUALIFY UNDER 107 IN TWO OF THE OPENING EIGHT RACES
Despite the brilliance of Adrian Newey the early impressions on the Aston Martin is that it is on the slow and difficult side. Whilst we’re sure it will come good, we’re not so sure about one of their drivers doing much with the good car, or the bad one. The ugly too. With throw-away talk of being over four seconds slower, Lance Stroll will really struggle to get under the 107% rule, given how ineffective he is of getting out of Q1 and Brazilian Gravel Traps. So another of our 2026 F1 Bold Predictions is Lance Stroll to fail to qualify for two of the opening six races. Of course having a moneybags for a father/team owners means they’ll find a way to put him on the grid.
Crowd chanting Drugovich’s name while Stroll beachs the car at Brazilian GP – YouTube
CARLOS SAINZ WILL WIN A GRAND PRIX
It might take a while in 2026, but much like 2025 Carlos Sainz will grow into the season, eventually becoming the dominant Williams driver, a regular top six qualifier and point scorer. But he will impress all, and Willaims fand and well-wishers by winning a Grand Prix in the second half of the season. Maybe a street track like Azerbaijan or Singapore. Alex Albon will keep him honest and grab a podium himself, and the Sainz-Albon partnership becomes the new Hakkinen-Coulthard.
MAX VERSTAPPEN WILL WIN THE CHAMPIONSHIP THEN RETIRE TO GO AN ATTEMPT THE 24 HOUR LE MANS, INDY 500 AND BATHURST 1000 IN 2027.
Driven to irritation by the 2026 spec cars, but still good enough to master it all, Max Verstappen will take out the 2026 Championship for Red Bull Ford, then announce his retirement from F1. With Red Bull’s blessing as the energy drink company sponsors all three attempts.
Max Verstappen then bores of those racing events and decides to take part in the Red Bull Air Race series, and wins that too.
RACING BULLS DRIVERS TO HAVE THREE INTRA-TEAM ON TRACK CLASHES ON TRACK
Liam Lawson is a hard racer, and appears to be a reasonably grumpy guy, so he is always a good chance of getting involved in an on track clash or two. This year he has another F2 rookie as a team mate, one who’ll be trying to prove his worth in the cut throat Red Bull system. Especially since his F2 results kind of don’t warrant a seat over better performers from 2025. So with so much at stake and a lot of chest beating going on, risks will be taken, and carbon fibre will fly. As will the tempers and tantrums. And the smiles at Netflix who don’t have to manufacture an intra-team rivalry.
THE AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX WILL SEE EIGHT CARS FAIL TO MAKE IT AROUND THE FIRST LAP
The most recent test at Bahrain saw the F1 drivers attempt to do a new start with all the new gadgets and it proved a bit of a disaster. Thankfully the first race of the season is in Melbourne which should guarantee a green track, high possibility of wet weather and first race nerves to go with new, mostly untried technology. All mixed together means chaos with stalled cars, first and third corner prangs, and at least one Alpine in the wall on the back straight. Most likely Crashapinto.
SERGIO PEREZ WILL SCORE A PODIUM
As much as some F1 people lampooned Sergio Perez in his final Red Bull years, not us, we’re way to professional for that, Perez was and has always been a great driver of cars in the midfield, and is one of the best of all time of hauling midfield cars into podium gaining positions. Given recent testing of the Cadillac shows that is more lower midfield than embarrassing F2 or Mastercard Lola F1 from 1997 slow, it means the car will be competitive enough. And if a car is competitive enough, and a race is chaotic enough, then the opportunity is there for Perez to take full advantage like he knows how.
AN INCIDENT INVOLVING LANDO NORRIS’ FATHER AND AN UNNAMED F1 DRIVER LEADS TO ALL FATHER BEING BANNED FROM F1 PIT LANE AND GARAGES
Some people say that there is way too much focus on the parent of F1 drivers during an F1 weekend and we’d agree. Lando Norris’ father appears to be the universally most disliked, and this will lead to conflict during the early parts of the season. A flash point caused by arrogance at the Monaco Grand Prix will be rumoured and true, but no details of the event will ever get out, with the F1 bosses redacting evidence quicker than a US government employee. But in a usual knee-jerk reaction kind of way the FIA president will ban all parents from pitlane for the entire Grand Prix weekend until after the race has finished. This may mean less crosses to parents during a race instead of people who matter, which is also a good thing. It may lead to less hard truths from Jos Verstappen over a weekend, but he can make up for that elsewhere.
DONALD TRUMP WILL BE ON THE MIAMI GRAND PRIX PODIUM AND THE FIA WILL AWARD HIM THE RACE WINNER’S TROPHY AND GIVE THE F1 DRIVER AND TEAM THE REPLICA.
This is after the FIA stage a press conference on the Friday morning to give Donald Trump the FIA Peace Prize, to make it a solid two huge sporting wins.
THE SECOND VERSION OF THE F1 MOVIE WILL FEATURE A RECREATION OF THE INFAMOUS NELSON PIQUET – ELISEO SALAZAR FIGHT AT THE 1982 GERMAN GRAND PRIX
The F1 movie was a raging success in 2025, on the back of the world’s growing obsession with Formula 1, and that movie featured a moment from F1 history where Martin Donnelly had a crash where it was hard to believe he would survive. Which begged the question for F1 Movie II, what other moment could they use for the new F1 based movie. Our bold prediction is they will use the infamous fight between Nelson Piquet and Eliseo Salazar from the 1982 German Grand Prix. And for fun, we have a sample of what to look forward to below.
Piquet Rages After Salazar Shunt | 1982 German Grand Prix – YouTube
THE NEW FORMULA ONE CARS BECOMING SO MUCH LIKE FORMULA E MEANS THAT ONE TEAM WILL DROP AN UNDERPERFORMING DRIVER IN FAVOUR OF A FORMULA E DRIVER AND HOPEFULLY THAT WILL BE DAN TICKTUM
As Max Verstappen has already compared the current F1 cars to Formula E, why wouldn’t a team replace one of their drivers with a Formula E driver. Given the driver under the most pressure is probably Franco Colapinto, and his boss at Alpine is the notoriously ruthless Flavio Briatore, you can easily see the Argentine driver getting the arse at some stage in 2026, if his results don’t improve, which they may not. Although, he did score zero points, so you’d expect some improvement.
But Briatore is also one to take a risk on drivers, and there’s no greater risk than hiring Dan Ticktum. The British driver is an angry, angry young man, which makes him more entertaining than most other drivers and sports people on earth. He’s also fast enough to cut it F1 too. The reason he probably hasn’t made it to F1 is that he’s kind of a jerk, but given that Flavio is kind of a jerk too, it’s all good. For him, for Alpine and F1 fans everywhere who like a bit of spice. As for compensation, I’m sure Netflix will chick in a few million, as he will repay them threefold. If fans like Gunther’s swearing at Haas, they are going to love Dan Ticktum.
Dan Ticktum Rages at Eveyrone 😡😡#f1 #shorts #driving #youtubeshorts – YouTube
