Round 11 at the Hungaroring didn’t change the top three of the 2026 Power ranking, but it did reshape the fight immediately behind it. Pierre Gasly moved up to fourth, while Gabriel Bortoleto dropped out of the top 10 and Isack Hadjar took his place.
By Camille Fontaine
Max Verstappen remains the benchmark in the Power ranking after the Hungarian Grand Prix, holding P1 with a composite score of 75.5. The headline, though, is less about a change at the very top — there wasn’t one — and more about how the midfield of this metric continues to churn even when the lead stabilises. Verstappen’s lead is reinforced by the structure of the scoring model: it is built entirely from official qualifying and race results, with heavy emphasis on teammate head-to-head (40%) and grid-to-finish positions gained (30%), so the drivers who keep stacking weekends without big swings tend to accumulate separation.
Behind Verstappen, the order at the front is unchanged: Liam Lawson stays second on 67.0 and Sergio Pérez remains third on 64.5. That “top-three unchanged” signal matters because it hints at a developing rhythm across 11 races completed — the ranking rewards repeatable advantage across qualifying and races, not single standout moments. Verstappen’s own Hungary snapshot underlines that steadiness: he was classified second after starting fourth, scoring 18 points, with a qualifying position of sixth.
The biggest single upward step belongs to Esteban Ocon, who gains two places from P13 to P11 with a score of 46.8 for Haas. That jump is notable precisely because his Hungarian Grand Prix result itself was unremarkable in isolation: he qualified 15th, started 15th, and was classified 16th after 68 laps, lapped and out of the points. In this ranking’s logic, that kind of weekend doesn’t automatically sink you — the composite is season-wide, and the consistent accrual of teammate head-to-heads, classified finishes and average qualifying can outweigh one low-scoring round.
The more immediately visible movement comes from the top-10 reshuffle. Isack Hadjar is the new entry at P10 on 47.9 for Red Bull, rising one position from P11. That change is mirrored by Gabriel Bortoleto’s exit: he falls two places from P10 to P12 with 45.2 for Audi. Bortoleto’s Hungary line tells you why this is a knife-edge zone: he qualified 14th, started 14th and finished 11th, lapped after 69 laps and scoring 0 points. Moving up three places on Sunday wasn’t enough to defend a top-10 spot in a metric that also taxes average qualifying position and rewards season-long teammate advantage.
Pierre Gasly’s one-place rise is the cleanest “front-of-the-pack” change after Hungary: he climbs from P5 to P4 with a score of 58.7 for Alpine. On a weekend where the top three stayed frozen, that single step carries weight because it places Gasly closer to the established trio and, just as importantly, ahead of the pack that can swing wildly from round to round. With the composite score spanning 0–100 and scaled to the season’s best and worst, small positional changes can reflect a meaningful shift in how a driver’s full-season profile compares to peers — especially when teammate head-to-head accounts for almost half the final number.
Gasly’s gain comes at the expense of Carlos Sainz, who slips from P4 to P5 with 57.8 for Williams. The margin between them is slim enough to underline what this ranking is really tracking: a blend of qualifying position, race-to-race consistency, and the ability to outperform the other car in the same team. With only 11 races completed, those components can still reweight quickly, so P4 is less a destination than a contested ledge.
Charles Leclerc’s drop is another reminder that this isn’t a simple points table: he falls one place from P12 to P13 with 44.2 for Ferrari. In the same neighbourhood, Ocon’s rise to P11 and Bortoleto’s fall to P12 show how tightly packed this part of the ranking is — a couple of rounds’ worth of qualifying averages, teammate head-to-head wins or merely staying classified can shuffle the order without requiring any dramatic single-race outcome.
Hungary also offered contrasting examples of how the ‘positions gained’ component can help but not fully rescue a weekend. Verstappen improved from P4 on the grid to P2 at the flag, while Bortoleto went from P14 to P11. Both are positive grid-to-finish swings, yet their overall Power ranking implications diverge because this model simultaneously accounts for average qualifying position, consistency of classified finishes around a season mean, and that crucial teammate comparison. The upshot after Budapest is a clear split: stability at the top, with the most movement and opportunity concentrated from P4 through the edge of the top 10.
| Driver | Team | Before | After | Δ | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Esteban Ocon | Haas F1 Team | 13 | 11 | +2 | 46.8 |
| Gabriel Bortoleto | Audi | 10 | 12 | -2 | 45.2 |
| Pierre Gasly | Alpine F1 Team | 5 | 4 | +1 | 58.7 |
With Verstappen still P1 on 75.5 and the top three unchanged (Lawson 67.0, Pérez 64.5), the immediate battleground shifts to the next layer: Gasly’s move to P4 on 58.7 tightens the chase behind the leaders, while the P10–P13 cluster (Hadjar 47.9, Ocon 46.8, Bortoleto 45.2, Leclerc 44.2) looks primed for further round-to-round volatility as qualifying averages and teammate head-to-heads accumulate.