2026 Spanish Grand Prix Review: Madrid's Bold New Circuit Falls Flat

The 2026 Spanish Grand Prix was billed as Formula 1’s bold new chapter in Madrid. It played out like an old story: one long procession at the Madring, a spectacular stage that gave the drivers almost nothing to race with.

The backdrop was perfect. The show on track was not.

Built part on permanent asphalt and part on public roads looping in and out of the IFEMA conference centre in north-east Madrid, the Madring arrived with the swagger of a fresh concept. Designer Jarno Zaffelli had spoken of its “flow” and its ambition to prove that a street circuit “is not boring”.

The crowd bought in. The drivers loved the setting. The race exposed the flaw.

Atmosphere 1, Racing 0

Across the paddock, the verdict on Madrid itself was glowing. Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz embraced the home Grand Prix feel. Lewis Hamilton praised the buzz. Rookie Arvid Lindblad spoke warmly about the off-track experience.

Then came the caveat.

Lindblad admitted it “wasn’t the most exciting race”. Audi’s Gabriel Bortoleto went further when asked if it was as dull to drive as it looked.

“Yeah, I almost fell asleep as well,” he said.

The problem wasn’t just the lack of overtakes. It was the way the race locked into a static pattern and refused to budge.

Haas’s Esteban Ocon pointed to tyre behaviour as a key culprit. No degradation, no graining, no strategic variation.

“It was like 120% from as soon as you pitted to the end,” he said. “And because the graining didn’t happen, that’s where we ended up. If we had a race on Friday, it would have been much better.”

So the tyres held on. The race did not.

A Layout That Won’t Let Them Race

Once the drivers turned to the layout itself, the tone hardened.

Max Verstappen’s lap-one excursion at the opening chicane told its own story: no room, no margin, no real passing chance. The Turn 5-6 chicane drew almost universal criticism as too tight, too narrow, too awkward. The sweep of left-handers after the banked La Monumental section hemmed the drivers in again.

Lando Norris, never shy in a press conference, cut through the politeness.

“I don’t know how someone looks at this design and goes, mint!” he said.

Visibility became another flashpoint. A string of blind corners left several drivers uncomfortable. Sainz did not sugar-coat his safety concerns.

“Same as in Jeddah and Baku, it’s poor,” he said. He noted that the FIA seems “happy to go in this direction” with new circuits, while drivers continue to push for better safety standards.

“We’re going to go towards these circuits because going at 260km/h, 270km/h on esses that you cannot see through is definitely eye-opening and definitely makes you question how safe everything is.”

Alonso, usually one to relish a challenge, punctured the hype around the showpiece La Monumental banking. For him, it was all theatre, no test.

“It is sad, you know, in a way, with this generation of cars to come to a very nice circuit like this one, with challenges here and there, like Monumental corner, Turn 12, and the driver input is just nothing,” he said, joking that his Aston Martin press officer Michael Clayton “can drive in Turn 12 because you go flat with no deployment.”

When your headline corner is described as something a PR officer could take flat-out, the design brief has missed the mark.

Where Can You Actually Pass?

George Russell homed in on what might be the Madring’s core sporting flaw.

“I guess the one small frustration in the design is just the lack of clear overtaking opportunities,” he said. “On every track, at the end of a long straight, you need a clear opportunity to overtake, and the longest straight here goes into that tight roundabout section. So that’s probably the only thing we wish was different.”

It’s a simple racing truth: long straight, big braking zone, space to attack. Madrid gives you the straight, then throws it away.

Norris went straight to the knife.

“They should get rid of [Turns] 18-19 – useless,” he said.

He sketched a different vision: “a straight line from [Turn] 17 straight to 20, have a much wider entry like Austin Turn 1 or Turn 10 in Austin. A big hairpin, you create much better opportunities for everyone and you’ll be able to enjoy the race.”

The message was clear. The Madring doesn’t need a full redesign, just smarter geometry in the right places. Norris pointed to Turn 5, 6, 7 as “trickier ones” that also need attention.

Valtteri Bottas, driving for Cadillac, echoed Russell’s frustration after the longest straight.

“Quite easy” to defend, he said. No reward for the pursuer, too much protection for the car in front.

His bigger issue lay deeper into the lap.

“What I’m not a big fan of is the sector two and three, how blind it is, especially people on the slow laps. Sometimes it’s a bit sketchy, unnecessarily blind in places. But that was the first time we went to Saudi, it was the same issue and then they widened some of the walls, so I don’t know – maybe there’s some room for improvement.”

The template is there: Saudi Arabia softened its rough edges. Madrid may have to follow.

Turn 5: The Corner Everyone Hates

If there was a single corner that united the grid, it was Turn 5.

On paper, it should work: heavy braking, a chicane, a natural overtaking zone. In reality, the bumps, high kerbs and tight width shut the door.

Williams’s Alex Albon spelled it out.

“I think we need to revisit this track a little bit… because I think, I don’t know if you watched the F3 and F2 races, but it was all drivers going side by side in the chicane and then complaining that one of them didn’t let them back past, so that corner in particular is the corner that I think needs the most work.”

Bortoleto went further, questioning why that kind of chicane exists at all with modern machinery.

“I just don’t see how… Like even if they slow down the corner, what are they going to do, you know… especially with the big cars we have nowadays; if it was 1990s cars, maybe you could put something, but it’s not like this anymore.”

The cars have grown. The walls have stayed close. The compromises are catching up.

Verstappen, who had already had his say on the opening chicane, turned his attention back to La Monumental. He liked the idea, not the execution.

“Yeah, I mean, it’s cool, the banking, but I think they should have done it the other way around, though. Initially more banking and then just flatten it out.”

The theme was constant: the raw ingredients are there, but the recipe is off.

Street Circuits vs Modern F1

Strip away the specifics of Turn 5 or Turn 18, and another question sits underneath: are modern F1 cars simply too big, too heavy, too unwieldy for tight street layouts like this?

Verstappen didn’t hesitate.

“I’m not a fan of street circuits, so that will never change. I will always prefer to drive on a track like Spa,” he said. He praised the organisation and the way Madrid had “built everything up”, but the format itself still leaves him cold. “I’m not a fan of street circuits.”

Alonso, racing in front of his home fans, landed in roughly the same place.

“I still prefer normal circuits. You know, in general, you push the limits of the car… On a street circuit, you are always 95% because the track is always surprising you.”

That’s the paradox. Street races sell the spectacle, the skyline, the proximity. The drivers want grip, runoff, and room to lean on the car. The Madring sits right on that fault line.

Change Is Coming

The criticism has not been fired into a void. Discussions over changes to the Madring layout are already under way for the next Spanish Grand Prix. The drivers have been blunt, specific and, in many cases, aligned.

Widen the blind sections. Rework the chicanes. Give the longest straight a proper braking zone. Turn a showpiece venue into a racetrack worthy of the calendar.

Madrid has the crowd, the setting, the ambition. Now it has something else: a very clear to-do list from the fastest people on the planet.