Who's smiling ahead of the British Grand Prix – and who desperately needs a good result?

Last season's race saw Lando Norris beat Oscar Piastri to victory, with Nico Hulkenberg holding off Lewis Hamilton to finally achieve the first podium finish of his Formula One career. In 2026, Mercedes appear the team to beat, with Kimi Antonelli and George Russell winning all but one of the races so far this season.

In Austria, Russell took his first win since the season opener in Austria and will now look to close the 40 point gap to championship leader Antonelli further, as he looks to win on home soil for the first time in his career.

Russell was expected to dominate the 2026 season after winning the Australian Grand Prix, however, since then, he has been outperformed by his young teammate Antonelli, while also suffering some bad luck in certain races. Russell will be hoping the victory in Austria puts him on the right path for the remainder of the 2026 season.

Antonelli did show stronger pace towards the end of the Austrian Grand Prix, but Russell showed in Austria that he can deliver the goods, particularly if he sticks his car on pole and leads at the start of the race. The confidence he should get from racing in front of his home crowd should be enough of a feel-good factor to help him achieve his third victory of the season at Silverstone.

The four-time world champion is back in contention for victories after finishing just 1.6 seconds behind Russell at the Austrian Grand Prix. Verstappen will be happy that he has got a car that can put him back towards the front of the grid and if it wasn't for his late second stop in Austria, he might have been close enough to challenge Russell, after having to claw back a 10 second gap.

Speculation continues to mount surrounding his future with reports emerging that his representatives have held talks with McLaren. If Red Bull can prove to Verstappen that Austria can be a consistent rather than a one-off event, then he might just see his future is best served at his current team.

Austria was no doubt disappointing for Lewis Hamilton after the highs of Barcelona. However, he managed to beat Leclerc again at a track where the Monegasque runs strongly, and a fifth place finish was a decent result despite his troubles on the day.

Arriving at a track where you hold the record for the most wins of any driver at a single track should be enough for Hamilton to feel good going into the British Grand Prix, regardless of his car's performance at the last race.

Pressure continues to mount on Leclerc thanks to the improvements made by his teammate Hamilton, as well as his own relative lack of performance, scoring just 16 points across the last four races. In that time he has been outscored by every other driver inside the top 10 of the championship, including the Alpine or Pierre Gasly and Liam Lawson in the Racing Bulls.

Hamilton in his last five races has more points than Leclerc has in the entirety of the 2026 season. Austria offered promise with what was nearly a pole position, but he finished eighth, not helped by his strategy, but at least it was clean as he did not crash his car.

After finishing fifth in the constructors' championship last season, 2026 has been a struggle for Williams. Both cars were knocked out of Q1 in Austria, with Sainz retiring from the race and Albon only finishing P17, with the only driver who finished the race finishing behind the Williams driver being the Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso.

Sainz has not scored any points since Canada, while Albon has been out of the top 10 in the last two races. After their recent struggles, Williams are a team who will be desperate for a good result.

Hulkenberg returns to the track where he took his first podium finish of his F1 career one year ago. After a strong 2025, it has been a tough season for the German and Audi in general. Hulkenberg is yet to score his first points of the season while Gabriel Bortoleto only has two to his name from the Australian Grand Prix.

So far this season, Hulkenberg has been outperformed by his teammate on race day with Bortoleto leading the head-to-head battle 5-3, though the German leads by the same scoreline when it comes to qualifying.