Hamilton Extends His Lead as Sepang Chaos Hits McLaren and VELO

First of all I want to apologise for the late review of the Bahrain GP in Malaysia for all of you who use Snus Vikings for your F1 race news (both of you), although the weather was hot for the GP, it's been fairly miserable in my corner of the UK and I've been out with a horrible cold for the last couple of days.  That being said it was an important race for both the Nicotine Pouch World Championship as well as the overall title race and we have much to discuss.

Formula 1's unexpected return to Sepang produced almost everything that had made the Malaysian circuit such a memorable part of the calendar: tropical rain, changing grip, difficult tyre decisions, Safety Cars, overtaking and a race in which the order could change remarkably quickly.

Unfortunately, it also produced something rather less impressive. A software problem affecting the new-generation power units left cars crawling around during the formation laps, forced the start procedure to be abandoned and contributed to an extraordinary delay before racing could properly begin. Once it finally did, however, Max Verstappen emerged from the confusion to take his first victory of 2026, while Lewis Hamilton produced one of the recoveries of the year to finish third and extend his lead in the Snus Vikings Nicotine Pouch Formula 1 Championship. 

For Ferrari and ZYN, Hamilton's podium combined with Charles Leclerc's fourth place made Malaysia another extremely productive weekend. McLaren and VELO, meanwhile, scored with both cars but lacked the performance they had shown earlier in the summer, leaving Sepang with their championship challenge heading in the wrong direction for a second consecutive race.

Verstappen Finally Gets His 2026 Victory

After coming within 0.196 seconds of George Russell in Azerbaijan, Verstappen arrived in Malaysia looking increasingly likely to end his winless start to the season. He took his first pole of 2026 on Saturday and, despite everything Sepang subsequently threw at him, converted it into victory.

It was Verstappen's 72nd Formula 1 win, but his first of the season and the first victory for Red Bull Ford Powertrains as a power-unit manufacturer. 

The final result was:

Verstappen finished 2.307 seconds ahead of Antonelli, with Hamilton another 2.612 seconds behind. Leclerc followed in fourth, while George Russell's late technical retirement denied Mercedes the opportunity to put both cars near the front. 

For our championship, however, the most important result was behind Verstappen and Antonelli. Hamilton had started the weekend 13 points ahead of Norris but by Sunday evening, that advantage had become considerably healthier.

Before the Racing Came the Farce

The weather had always been expected to play a role at Sepang, and heavy rain duly arrived before the start. What nobody anticipated was that the first wet running of the 2026 season would expose a problem in the cars' power-delivery software.

The field eventually left behind the Safety Car for two formation laps, but cars began suffering severe power problems while circulating at low speed on the wet track. Verstappen was among the first to report that he could no longer accelerate properly, Hamilton slowed and stopped before rebooting his Ferrari, and several other drivers experienced similar difficulties. 

The FIA subsequently explained that the combination of low engine speeds, low grip, wet-weather energy-management settings and the particular configuration of Sepang had created an unforeseen software problem. An emergency update had to be prepared and installed before the race could proceed.

The result was a surreal spectacle in which the most technologically advanced racing cars in the world were struggling simply to complete formation laps.

Hamilton and Verstappen even compared the experience with driving the Lego cars used for entertainment at Silverstone earlier in the season, while criticism of the regulations and the FIA continued after the race. The governing body has said the episode will be reviewed with the teams and power-unit manufacturers. 

It was an embarrassing opening to what subsequently became a genuinely entertaining Grand Prix.

The Wrong Tyre Nearly Ruins Hamilton's Afternoon

When the racing finally began, Ferrari made another gamble and Hamilton was among the drivers starting on slick tyres despite the circuit remaining sufficiently wet for intermediates, and the decision initially looked disastrous. Cars on the intermediates immediately had significantly more grip, while Hamilton tumbled down the order.

At one stage he had fallen as low as 17th, nearly a minute behind the leaders. Hamilton later admitted that once he saw the amount of spray coming from Verstappen's car, he realised just how much trouble he was in. Yet rather than abandoning the strategy immediately, he committed to it and waited for conditions to move towards the slick tyre. 

Eventually they did and once slicks became competitive Hamilton began moving back through the field, while the first Safety Car, triggered when Valtteri Bottas ended up in the gravel on lap nine, helped bring the different strategies back together. From there Hamilton's race changed completely and instead of limiting the damage from a failed gamble, he suddenly had the opportunity to fight for a podium, and by the chequered flag he had recovered all the way to third.

Considering how bleak his prospects had looked during the opening laps, it was an enormously valuable 15 points.

Leclerc Makes It a Strong Ferrari and ZYN Weekend

Charles Leclerc's afternoon was less spectacular but almost as important for the Nicotine Pouch Championship.

Having started fourth after Isack Hadjar's grid penalty, Leclerc eventually finished in the same position, just 7.258 seconds behind Verstappen which earned another 12 points for Ferrari and ZYN. Combined with Hamilton's 15, Ferrari collected 27 points from Sepang, extending its advantage in our teams' championship for the second successive race.

McLaren and VELO had spent Hungary, Zandvoort, Monza and Madrid steadily dismantling Ferrari's once enormous lead. The advantage fell from 90 points after Belgium to only 52 after Spain.

Baku stopped that momentum and Malaysia has now pushed it further in the opposite direction.

McLaren's Gamble Goes Wrong

McLaren made the same basic mistake as Ferrari at the start by sending both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris out on medium slicks.

The team had expected the circuit to dry more quickly than it did, but instead the McLarens struggled badly during the opening phase. According to the team's own race report, the slick runners were at one stage approximately 15 seconds per lap slower than cars on intermediates. 

Piastri recognised the problem quickly and switched to intermediates before the standing start, while Norris remained committed to the slicks. Bottas's lap-nine accident and the resulting Safety Car eventually reduced some of the damage, allowing both McLarens to rejoin the strategic battle.

But strategy wasn't McLaren's only problem and the uncomfortable conclusion from Sepang was that the car simply wasn't quick enough.

Team principal Andrea Stella acknowledged afterwards that McLaren effectively had the fourth-fastest package over the weekend, while Motorsport.com reported that Norris was also dealing with recurring power-unit issues that hurt his straight-line performance. 

Norris Loses More Ground

Piastri eventually recovered to sixth, but Norris's afternoon became even more complicated late in the race. The McLarens had been working their way back towards respectable points when Alex Albon's stopped Williams initially triggered a Virtual Safety Car and subsequently a full Safety Car. Russell then stopped on track behind the Safety Car, bunching the field together.

As Norris attempted to warm his tyres on the main straight, he was caught out by the cars ahead slowing and had to take avoiding action into the gravel. He dropped to 11th before recovering to ninth over the final four racing laps. 

Norris accepted responsibility for the mistake afterwards but in the context of the Nicotine Pouch Championship, it was considerably more expensive as Hamilton scored 15 points and Norris scored two.

The 13-point championship advantage Hamilton brought to Malaysia doubled to 26.

Nicotine Pouch Drivers' Championship After Malaysia

Leclerc has now overtaken Norris so although Norris has lost 13 points to Hamilton, the bigger immediate problem for McLaren and VELO is that their leading driver has now fallen from second to third.

The championship order is:

That gives Hamilton a 23-point lead over Leclerc, with Norris a further three points behind.

For the first time in this recent run of races, Ferrari and ZYN occupy first and second in the drivers' competition.

Ferrari and ZYN Stretch Their Teams' Lead to 89 Points

Ferrari scored 27 points through Hamilton and Leclerc and McLaren collected ten, with Piastri's sixth worth eight and Norris's ninth adding two. 

Which gives us the following team standings:

Ferrari's advantage has consequently increased from 72 to 89 points.

That almost completely reverses the progress McLaren had made since Belgium. Ferrari led by 90 points after Spa; McLaren reduced that to 87 after Hungary, 75 after Zandvoort, 59 after Monza and 52 after Madrid.

Baku moved it back to 72 and now Malaysia has taken it to 89, with Ferrari and ZYN, in the space of two races, effectively restoring the enormous advantage that McLaren spent much of the late summer eroding.

Another Empty Weekend for Cadillac and 77

There was little relief for Cadillac and 77.

Bottas had qualified at the back of the field and his race lasted only nine laps before he became stranded in the gravel, bringing out the first Safety Car. He was ultimately classified as a retirement, while Sergio Pérez finished 19th.

The unpredictable conditions had looked like precisely the sort of opportunity that might finally give Bottas a chance of breaking into the points, particularly given his previous experience at Sepang, but instead Malaysia became another weekend to forget.

However, he's making the best of it and is currently cycling from Malaysia to the next race in Singapore.  This may be the closest 2 races outside of the European races with Sepang and the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore being 206 miles apart by road (according to El Goog), so it isn't so bad and considering the usual fitness level of Formula 1 drivers, is probably not much more than Valteri's normal training ride.

Sepang Shows What F1 Has Been Missing

The software debacle inevitably dominated much of the discussion afterwards, and understandably so. Cars becoming effectively powerless because their energy-management software had encountered a combination of conditions it could not properly handle was hardly the image Formula 1 wanted to project for its first wet race under the new regulations.

Yet once the technical problems were solved, the race itself provided a strong argument for Sepang's return.

Changing conditions created genuine strategic uncertainty, the crossover between intermediates and slicks mattered, there were overtaking opportunities throughout the field and Safety Cars repeatedly altered the complexion of the race. Motorsport.com described Sepang as one of the best circuits available to Formula 1, while even criticism of the chaotic weekend acknowledged that the actual race became an absorbing contest. 

Verstappen was ultimately the deserving winner, converting his first pole of the season into Red Bull's first victory of 2026, while Antonelli's second place strengthened his position in the real Formula 1 championship. Russell's late power-unit failure, by contrast, was another major blow to his title hopes.

For the Snus Vikings championship, though, the biggest winner was Hamilton.

From Five Points to 26 in Two Races

After the Spanish Grand Prix, Norris had reduced a deficit that once stood at 56 points to just five. McLaren and VELO appeared to have all the momentum, Ferrari's teams' lead had fallen to 52 points, and one more strong weekend could potentially have put Norris at the top of the standings.

Instead, Baku and Sepang have transformed the picture. Hamilton's advantage went from five points to 13 in Azerbaijan and now, after Malaysia, he sits 26 points ahead of Norris. More importantly, Norris is no longer his closest challenger: Leclerc has quietly moved three points ahead of the McLaren driver and Ferrari and ZYN now have Hamilton first, Leclerc second and an 89-point teams' advantage.

McLaren's problem is no longer simply that two chaotic races have gone against it. Stella's admission that the car was only the fourth-fastest package in Malaysia raises a more fundamental question about whether McLaren can rediscover the performance that made it so formidable around Hungary, Zandvoort and Madrid. 

The answer may come quickly because Formula 1 now heads straight to Singapore, where an entirely different circuit awaits. Sepang may have begun with a software farce, but by the time the chequered flag fell it had delivered a significant shift in the Nicotine Pouch Formula 1 Championship.

Verstappen won the race, but Ferrari and ZYN won the weekend. Hamilton strengthened his lead, Leclerc moved into second, and McLaren and VELO suddenly have a great deal of ground to recover.