Why Ferrari could be a dark horse for the title – but we can't be sure until October

OPINION: After all the Red Bull vs McLaren talk, Ferrari has sneaked into the Formula 1 world title battle from the outside rail. With two potentially favourable tracks coming up, the Scuderia could make certain its championship-fighting credentials – but its ultimate test won’t be until it heads west

Amid all the excitement about Formula 1’s championship battle between Red Bull and McLaren, it has almost snuck under the radar that someone else is genuinely in the mix too. While the focus has been on what is now an eight point gap between F1’s top two teams, few outside of Maranello have realised that Ferrari is well in the mix – just a further 31 points back.

The Prancing Horse’s pre-summer break struggles with its Spanish GP floor served to almost make the squad anonymous when it came to title talk, as all eyes revolved on how Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri were faring against Max Verstappen.

Share Or Save This Story

Author Jonathan Noble

Jonathan Noble is Motorsport.com’s Formula 1 editor. Having graduated from University of Sussex Jonathan worked for sports news agency Collings Sports reporting on F1, F3, touring cars and other sports, with articles appearing in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, Reuters, Autosport and other publications. In 1999 he moved to Haymarket Publishing to become a senior editor at Autosport Special Projects, and one year later he became Autosport’s grand prix editor. In 2015 he moved to Motorsport Network, becoming the F1 editor for Motorsport.com. He is also a member of the Guild of Motoring Writers, and sits on the FIA Media Council.

Jonathan has won multiple awards for journalism - in 1991 he was the winner of the Guild of Motoring Writers’ Sir William Lyons’ Award for young journalists, in 2010 he was awarded the Outstanding Individual accolade for consumer journalism in the Haymarket wards, in 2011 he won Haymarket’s Scoop of the Year, and in 2018 he was awarded a prestigious Medaglia d’Oro at the Lorenzo Bandini Awards for his contribution to F1 journalism.