Pre-season title predictions in Formula 1 are mostly a ritual. Drivers are filmed, asked who will win the championship, and almost always retreat into the safest answer about their own ambitions. Carlos Sainz, fronting up to the camera in late February with the 2026 power-unit era still a paper projection, refused to do that.
'I'll say two names. Okay. Can I say two names? George Russell or Maxin,' Sainz said, using the Spanish-language shorthand that drivers across the grid use for Verstappen's first name. The follow-up question — why those two — got nothing.
'No, you cannot,' was Sainz's complete response when the camera tried again.
Three months in, the refusal to elaborate looks more pointed than coy. Russell, the first name in Sainz's list, anchors a Mercedes team that has won at every venue the 2026 calendar has so far visited. His teammate Kimi Antonelli leads the drivers' championship after three consecutive Grand Prix wins, and the conversation inside the paddock is increasingly about whether the championship is over before it has properly started. Sainz, Russell's teammate at Williams during the 2025 season's late stages and a driver who had access to Mercedes power-unit simulation data through that period, would have been one of a handful of people with the hard numbers to back his pick.
The second name has not yet aged as well. Max Verstappen is sixth in the standings, navigating an RB22 chassis that is the most aerodynamically experimental on the grid but cannot match Mercedes for power or Ferrari for cornering. The three-time world champion has openly described the 2026 cars as 'probably my least favourite' he has driven in his F1 career, and Red Bull's race-by-race messaging has slid from championship intent to development damage limitation.
Sainz's instinct for Verstappen does have form, however. The two raced against each other in karting, in junior single-seaters, and across all of Verstappen's senior career, and Sainz has been consistent for years that he believes Verstappen finds another half-second when his car is anywhere close. The 2026 Verstappen comeback narrative depends on Red Bull's ADUO-tier engine upgrade — the catch-up mechanism the FIA put into the rule book specifically so Honda and Audi power units could narrow the gap mid-season — landing in the second half of the calendar. Sainz's call appears to have priced that in.
The third name in the room, and the one Sainz pointedly did not include, is Antonelli. The 19-year-old's three-race winning streak is the surprise of the 2026 season, and statistical models that look at drivers who win three consecutive races as rookies have started to give him meaningful championship odds. Sainz, who knew Antonelli through Mercedes' simulation programme, may have considered the Italian too inconsistent across full race distances to be a complete bet. The data so far suggests he undercounted the rookie.
Where Sainz did not undercount is the team. His two-name list is, in effect, a Mercedes prediction with a Verstappen comeback hedge. That description fits the 2026 championship picture to date better than any other paddock prediction made in pre-season. Sainz refused to explain why. Eleven races in, the explanation looks like it might write itself.
