Carlos Sainz’s season-long lap-one progress has moved him to the top of the 2026 ‘Most positions gained on lap one’ table after round four in Miami. The shake-up also pushed Valtteri Bottas out of the top 10, despite his season total still sitting in the black.
By Nadia Okafor
The Miami Grand Prix has flipped the lead of the 2026 ‘Most positions gained on lap one’ ranking, with Carlos Sainz moving from second to first on +16. That change matters because this table rewards the repeatable skill of making early forward progress from your grid slot, and Sainz has now turned that across four rounds into the season’s best cumulative opening-lap return — taking over from previous leader Fernando Alonso, who drops to third on +13.
Sainz’s Miami weekend underlined why this metric can diverge from the final result. He qualified 13th and finished ninth, banking 2 points — a recovery that fits the profile of a driver repeatedly improving his track position early and often. Alonso stays close in the ranking on +13, but the leadership swap shows Sainz’s aggregate lap-one work has become the benchmark, even with only four races completed.
Behind the headline change, the top of the table remains tight: Arvid Lindblad holds second on +13, level with Alonso. Further down, Miami reshaped the top 10 as Alexander Albon enters in sixth on +8 and Sergio Pérez comes in 10th on +7, while Valtteri Bottas and Pierre Gasly drop out entirely.
The steepest slide belongs to Bottas, who falls from fifth to 11th despite a season total of +6 — a reminder that being positive overall isn’t enough when others are adding gains faster. Bottas started 19th and finished 18th in Miami (lapped, 55 laps, 0 points), and his ranking position now leaves him needing a run of strong lap-one recoveries just to get back into the top-10 conversation.
| Driver | Team | Before | After | Δ | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Valtteri Bottas | Cadillac F1 Team | 5 | 11 | -6 | +6 |
| Max Verstappen | Red Bull | 12 | 18 | -6 | -7 |
| Pierre Gasly | Alpine F1 Team | 7 | 12 | -5 | +4 |
With Sainz now leading on +16 and Lindblad and Alonso tied on +13, the front of the lap-one gains table is set by small margins — one strong opening lap can still swing rank positions. The more immediate pressure is on the former top-10 names: Bottas (now 11th) and Gasly (12th) have positive totals but are being overtaken by rivals accumulating gains faster, while Verstappen’s -7 leaves him needing multiple forward first laps just to return to the mid-pack of this ranking.