Ferrari look strong again after Melbourne. The pattern is familiar: early promise, then mid-season fade and operational mistakes that the optimism crowd prefers to ignore. The last time Ferrari looked this strong, it ended in a collapse. That precedent is the story.
Ferrari’s Early-Season Promise Has a Clear Precedent
In March 2026, Formula 1’s own coverage and pundits like Jolyon Palmer framed the Australian Grand Prix as proof that Ferrari are back in the fight. Charles Leclerc led a Ferrari 1-2 in practice; the SF-26 showed strong race pace and limited the gap to Mercedes to around three tenths per lap in the race, as ScuderiaFans reported. Lewis Hamilton said Ferrari were “right in the fight” and that closing the gap was “not impossible,” according to Reuters. So the narrative of a Ferrari revival is again at full volume. The same narrative ran in 2018 and again after 2024. Both times it ended in disappointment.
The Last Time Ferrari Looked This Strong: 2018 and 2024
In 2018 Ferrari started the season with back-to-back wins in Australia and Bahrain with Sebastian Vettel; they dominated in Canada and Vettel led the championship. Formula 1 and The Checkered Flag documented that season as Ferrari’s strongest in a decade. The team had not won the constructors’ title since 2008, and 2018 was the first time since then that both Ferrari drivers won at least one race. By the end of the year, Mercedes had still taken both titles. Strong start; no championship. In 2024 Ferrari went one better: five Grand Prix wins, 652 points, and just 14 points behind constructors’ champions McLaren, as Formula 1’s end-of-year report noted. That was Ferrari’s best result in six years. Then 2025 happened. Ferrari finished fourth with zero wins and 398 points, 254 points fewer than 2024 and 435 points behind McLaren, as ScuderiaFans and Formula 1 reported. So the last time Ferrari looked this strong, it ended in a brutal comedown.
Mid-Season Fade and Operational Mistakes Are the Pattern
The optimism crowd ignores the mechanics of how those seasons unravelled. In 2025 Ferrari had already bet everything on 2026: they stopped aerodynamic development of the SF-25 in April 2025 to focus on the new rules. Team principal Fred Vasseur later acknowledged that the decision was not optimally managed and that he underestimated how hard it would be to keep morale and expectations aligned when everyone knew the current car would not be developed further, as ScuderiaFans reported. The result was a psychological and competitive vacuum. In 2026 at Melbourne, Ferrari again missed a strategic open goal: they did not pit during the first Virtual Safety Car while Mercedes did, and when a second VSC appeared their pit entry was closed. ScuderiaFans and post-race analysis described it as a strategic open goal missed. So the pattern is not just “Ferrari start strong.” It is strong start, then operational or strategic failure, then fade. Domenicali’s blunt verdict on Ferrari after 2025, as reported by GPBlog, was that the team needed a plan to “react, not to fade away.”
Why the Optimism Crowd Ignores the Pattern
After Melbourne 2026, headlines again asked whether 2026 is Ferrari’s year, as ESPN and others reported. Team principal Fred Vasseur has explicitly preached calm to avoid celebrating false dawns; Ferrari have not won a constructors’ championship since 2008 and have had near misses in 2010, 2012, 2017, 2018, and 2024. Each time, early promise was followed by strategic errors, development shortfalls, or a crushing follow-up season. GrandPrix247 and ScuderiaFans have argued that Ferrari and Vasseur have “nowhere to hide” in 2026 after sacrificing 2025 for a head start: the new car is under pressure to deliver a title. That pressure itself is part of the pattern. The optimism crowd focuses on lap times and practice results; the pattern match focuses on how those results turned into lost titles and the 2025 collapse.
What This Actually Means
Ferrari’s early-season promise in 2026 is real on the stopwatch but irrelevant to the only question that matters: can they sustain it and avoid the mistakes that have defined the last decade? The last time Ferrari looked this strong, 2018 and 2024, it ended in lost championships and then, in 2025, in a full collapse. The optimism around Melbourne is the same optimism that preceded those falls. Until Ferrari prove they can develop through a season and execute when it matters, the pattern match says to treat the current hype with caution.
What Is the Pattern of Ferrari F1 Performance?
Ferrari have repeatedly shown strong early-season or pre-season form followed by mid-season fade or a disastrous follow-up year. In 2018 they won early, led the championship, then lost both titles to Mercedes. In 2024 they finished 14 points behind McLaren; in 2025 they finished fourth, with no wins and a 435-point gap to McLaren. The common factors are operational and strategic errors, development delays or wrong bets (e.g. stopping 2025 development early), and an inability to convert early promise into a full-season title. The Scuderia last won the constructors’ championship in 2008.
Who Runs Ferrari in Formula 1?
Scuderia Ferrari is the Formula One division of Ferrari S.p.A. and has competed in every world championship since 1950. Since January 2023 the team principal has been Fred Vasseur, who took over from Mattia Binotto. Vasseur oversees technical and operational decisions, including the controversial call to halt 2025 car development early to focus on 2026.
Sources
Formula 1, ScuderiaFans, Reuters, The Checkered Flag, Formula 1, ScuderiaFans, ScuderiaFans, ScuderiaFans, GPBlog, ESPN, GrandPrix247