F1 2026 Japan GP LIVE: Race updates, times, stream and results – UK Times

“I would like to get ahead of one more Ferrari, I think we’re closer to being on par. We’re a bit closer this weekend, we’ll see how the race-pace is.

“We’ll give it our best.”

At least the McLarens look to be starting today!

With the barriers at turn 12 being fixed, we have a delay to the race start in Suzuka – we will start 10 minutes later.

1. George Russell (Mercedes) – 51 points

2. Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) – 47 points

3. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) – 34 points

4. Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) – 33 points

5. Ollie Bearman (Haas) – 17 points

7. Pierre Gasly (Alpine) – 9 points

8. Max Verstappen Red Bull) – 8 points

9. Liam Lawson (Racing Bulls) – 8 points

10. Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls) – 4 points

11. Isack Hadjar (Racing Bulls) – 4 points

12. Oscar Piastri (McLaren) – 3 points

13. Carlos Sainz (Williams) – 2 points

14. Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi) – 2 points

15. Franco Colapinto (Alpine) – 1 point

16. Esteban Ocon (Haas) – 0 points

17. Alex Albon (Williams) – 0 points

18. Sergio Perez (Cadillac) – 0 points

19. Nico Hulkenberg (Audi) – 0 points

20. Valtteri Bottas (Cadillac) – 0 points

21. Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) – 0 points

22. Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) – 0 points

On qualifying: “I’m feeling pretty decent, we’re just not very quick compared to Mercedes and McLaren.

“My first lap I was up, lost two-tenths on the straight, had a snap, changed the deployment. If we didn’t have that, I probably would have had fourth. It’s just the way this deployment situation is.

On race: “I don’t know if we can turn it into a podium, our race-distance. McLaren have taken a step forward and they have the Mercedes engine which is naturally a long way ahead of us.

“Even if you bring a three-tenths upgrade, it’s still a long way off. To close that gap is going to take us a mighty push.”

6. Racing Bulls – 12 points

11. Aston Martin – 0 points

“But after the final race, when you ask that question and you start laughing in my face while asking the question, and it’s clearly done with bad intent to ask the question at that point, it shows a massive lack of respect.

“So, for me, when you’re not respectful towards me, I don’t need to be respectful towards you.

“I think that’s how it works in life, very straightforward, very simple. And that’s why I did that. That’s why I did it here on Thursday. For me, it’s not correct.

“I have a lot of respect for everyone. I get asked a lot of questions, a lot of stupid questions as well, but I answer them. It’s not always that a question is great or whatever, that’s part of Formula 1. But this particular case, it was clearly done with bad intent.”

3. Oscar Piastri (McLaren) +0.354

4. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) +0.627

5. Lando Norris (McLaren) +0.631

7. Pierre Gasly (Alpine) +0.913

8. Isack Hadjar (Racing Bulls) +1.200

9. Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi) +1.496

10. Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls) +1.541

12. Esteban Ocon (Haas) – 1:30:309

13. Nico Hulkenberg (Audi) – 1:30:387

14. Liam Lawson (Racing Bulls) – 1:30:395

15. Franco Colapinto (Alpine) – 1:30:627

16. Carlos Sainz (Williams) – 1:31:033

17. Alex Albon (Williams) – 1:31:088

18. Ollie Bearman (Haas) – 1:31:090

19. Sergio Perez (Cadillac) – 1:32:206

20. Valtteri Bottas (Cadillac) – 1:32:330

21. Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) – 1:32:645

22. Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) -1:32:920

“As a driver, you should be rewarded for your bravery and your skills. But if you now go through a corner as fast as possible, over the course of a lap you end up being slower. That takes away the whole racing feeling,” Verstappen Snr told De Telegraaf.

“I get the impression some people just say things to stay in the spotlight. Max’s feeling in the car has nothing to do with performance.

“They should embrace how direct Max is. Or do they only want yes-men in this sport? Or drivers who say everything is great but don’t mean a word of it?”

“He used to think racing a Formula 1 car was the most beautiful thing there was. But now I have a rather bleak outlook. I wish I could say it wasn’t so, but with an eye on his future I do see this becoming a problem.”

“It impacted our ability to test things, also to do high fuel running for tomorrow, it’s been difficult, I’ve been playing a lot of catch-up. I don’t feel like I was on top form, made a couple of mistakes on my final lap.

“I’m happy to P5, very close to Charles, I did a good job. Could I have been better? Yes. Could have been a lot worse.

“We certainly felt better yesterday. We seemed to take a step forward in quali now. Cars are sensitive to wind etc, we’re happy with the team today.”

“In the first run, we had a switch issue on the car and we lost time on the straights. On run two, I didn’t find any pace, so I need to understand whether there was still a small issue with the car or if it was fixed, but there are very tight margins out there and it wasn’t enough to get through today.

“It’s a shame about qualifying, but there’s still going to be plenty of opportunities in the race, I’m optimistic. If it was 12 months ago, I’d be much less so, however there’s going to be a lot of overtaking.”