Interlagos Grand Prix: Grid Chaos as Champions Face Penalties

Grid chaos looms over Interlagos. Three world champions, one title contender, and a flurry of new engines have ripped up the expected starting order for the São Paulo Grand Prix.

Champions sent to the back

Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen will all be hit with grid penalties after Ferrari and Red Bull pushed their power units beyond the season limits.

Ferrari have gone over their allocation of Internal Combustion Engines on both Hamilton’s and Leclerc’s cars. The price is steep: 10-place grid drops for each. Whatever they do in qualifying on Saturday, both scarlet cars – and Hamilton’s Ferrari-powered machine – are guaranteed to slide down the order.

Red Bull have gone even further with Verstappen. His car has taken new components across three key areas: the ICE, Turbo Charger and Exhaust. That combination triggers a back-of-the-grid start under the regulations, no matter how quick he is over a single lap.

The penalties don’t stop there. 2026 entrants Cadillac, already working in the background, have supplied Sergio Perez with a fresh Ferrari ICE, Turbo Charger and MGU-K. That change also carries a grid drop for the Mexican, adding another twist to a weekend that was already braced for volatility.

The rulebook bites hard

The sporting regulations are ruthless but clear. The first time a driver exceeds the season allocation of any power unit element, they receive a 10-place grid penalty. Every further breach for that same element brings a five-place drop.

Those penalties stack. If the combined sanction goes beyond 15 places, the driver is ordered to start from the back of the grid. That’s the territory Verstappen has landed in, and it’s where Hamilton and Leclerc were always at risk of heading if their teams gambled on fresh hardware this late in the year.

The result is a qualifying session with a split personality: a fight for pole on paper, and a separate, quieter battle to land the best possible “net” starting spot once the penalties are applied.

Recovery drives incoming

What it does guarantee is spectacle on Sunday.

Hamilton, Verstappen and Leclerc will all be forced into recovery mode, carving their way through the midfield and beyond in a race that already tends to produce drama. Interlagos is short, tight, and unforgiving. It’s also the scene of some of the sport’s most famous comebacks.

Hamilton knows that better than most. In 2021, he was thrown to the back of the grid for the Sprint after a Drag Reduction System irregularity saw him disqualified from Friday qualifying. An engine change then added a five-place grid penalty for the Grand Prix itself. He responded with one of the defining weekends of his career, slicing through the field in both races and turning punishment into a statement.

Verstappen has his own São Paulo rescue acts on the record. In 2024, he started 17th after a wild qualifying session and an engine penalty, then surged all the way to victory. A year later, in 2025, Red Bull made sweeping changes to his car after another bruising Saturday, forcing him to start from the pit lane. He still fought his way to third.

Interlagos rewards aggression, confidence on the brakes and absolute faith in the car underneath. All three champions have that in abundance. They will need it.

Russell joins the list

Even before the latest wave of changes, Mercedes had already confirmed one penalty. George Russell will take a five-place grid drop this weekend for an engine change of his own, adding yet another quick car to the pack starting out of position.

So the script for São Paulo has flipped. The likely headline names will not be neatly lined up on the front rows. They will be buried in traffic, staring at a wall of cars and an uphill climb through one of Formula 1’s most atmospheric amphitheatres.

Pole will still matter. But on Sunday at Interlagos, the real story may come from how far, and how fast, the champions can climb.