🏁 There was no Grand Prix or Sprint this weekend. Formula One returns next week in Baku, with the Azerbaijan Grand Prix running 24–26 September and, unusually, racing on Saturday.
▪️Alpine raids Mercedes history: Alpine F1 Team has appointed former Mercedes technical chief Mike Elliott as Chief Technical Officer.
He will oversee Enstone’s technical and engineering operation, with David Sanchez understood to report to him — a significant strengthening of Alpine’s management structure.
▪️Mercedes already looking beyond its dominant 2026: With a 145-point Constructors’ Championship cushion, Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team says development of its 2027 car has already begun.
Rivals hoping Mercedes might be distracted by defending this year’s titles may wish to look away.
▪️Alonso keeps the retirement door ajar: Fernando Alonso remains one of the paddock’s principal 2027 uncertainties, with his future at Aston Martin F1 Team again under discussion following Madrid.
▪️The FIA’s 2026 rules remain a moving target: concerns over energy management have already produced ratified changes for 2027 and 2028, rebalancing combustion and electrical contribution and aiming to make qualifying more flat-out.
The first year of the new formula is increasingly looking like version 1.0 rather than the finished article.
▪️More Sprints are coming: Formula One’s newly announced 2027 calendar contains 24 Grands Prix and 10 Sprint events, up from six this season.
Portugal and Türkiye return — further evidence that Saturday racing is becoming a permanent commercial pillar rather than an experiment.
▪️Baku next: the 6.003km street circuit combines the calendar’s claustrophobic castle section with a 2.2km flat-out seafront run.
With the 2026 cars’ energy-management demands and active aerodynamics, it should provide one of the clearest tests yet of whether the new regulations work at the extremes.
♔ Fisherley headline: Mercedes is already thinking about 2027.
Alpine is hiring heavyweight help.
Alonso is still deciding.
📍 ‘And next Saturday, Baku provides the walls.’
