Fridays do not award points, but they do distribute momentum — and at Spa-Francorchamps, momentum is currency. Across two hours of running shaped by gravel, rain showers and one heavy crash, the 2026 Belgian Grand Prix began separating its contenders from its convalescents. These are our verdicts from the opening day in the Ardennes.

On the riseKimi Antonelli

No driver needed a clean Friday more than the championship leader, and none seized it so completely. Antonelli’s morning was genuinely troublesome — an edgy Mercedes, a near-miss with Carlos Sainz, sixth place. Then came the between-sessions transformation: wholesale setup changes, and a car reborn. His 1:45.944 was the day’s only sub-1m46s lap; his four-lap race simulation, every lap within three tenths, was the best of the abbreviated long runs. With his title lead down to 25 points after recent reliability scars, this was the response of a driver who intends to keep the trophy.

On the riseMax Verstappen

The local favourite — by passport proximity if not geography — opened his weekend by topping FP1, then logged the longest race run of anyone in FP2, seven laps quick enough to split the Mercedes pair. Yes, he triggered the first red flag by dragging gravel through Stavelot, and yes, the gear shifts earned a radio rebuke. But with Red Bull’s stable old-spec rear wing bolted on and the Orange Army already in full voice, Verstappen’s Friday had the unmistakable shape of a man building towards something.

On the riseLewis Hamilton and Ferrari’s One-Lap Edge

Second in the morning, fourth in the afternoon — and only a deleted-then-reinstated lap away from making it look better still. Hamilton’s Friday continued his quietly convincing Ferrari chapter, while the Scuderia’s decision to deploy its battery early in the lap gave Fred Vasseur the paddock’s quote of the day: 20 km/h (12 mph) slower than rivals before Les Combes, 20 km/h faster in the final straight. “It’s a trade-off for sure,” the team principal smiled. Charles Leclerc’s track-limits deletion at Raidillon dulled the scoreline, not the underlying speed.

On the riseFranco Colapinto

Seventh in FP2, ahead of George Russell’s Mercedes, on a circuit where Alpine expected to suffer. Colapinto senses the team has “found a little bit of performance this weekend” in the cooler Ardennes air — timely, with Racing Bulls just one point behind Alpine in the fight for fifth in the constructors’ championship. Honourable mention, too, to rookie Arvid Lindblad, ninth in both sessions and the team’s quiet benchmark.

On the slideGeorge Russell

Eighth in FP1, eighth in FP2, and 1.285 seconds behind his own team-mate in the latter — a chasm that no setup excuse fully explains. The telemetry points to energy harvesting: where Antonelli feathers the throttle before the timing line, Russell lifts far more aggressively, haemorrhaging roughly half a second in that zone alone. His own radio verdict said everything about a driver who knows something fundamental is off.

“The rears felt too cold, but not 1.2 seconds cold.”

— George Russell, Mercedes, on team radio

On the slideOscar Piastri

Some Fridays are lost to pace; Piastri’s was lost to plumbing. A hydraulic leak curtailed his FP1, then kept him in the garage for the opening 20 minutes of FP2, restricting him to 11 laps and sixth place, nearly a second off Antonelli. McLaren insists the car is “relatively competitive” here, and team-mate Norris proved the raw speed exists with second on the road — but Norris also carries a 10-place grid penalty, leaving Piastri as the team’s only clean shot at Sunday, on the back foot and short of laps.

On the slidePierre Gasly

The Frenchman’s heavy backwards meeting with the Fagnes barriers did more than end his own afternoon — it wiped out the final 15 minutes for everyone, shredding long-run programmes up and down the pit lane on the one weekend where race-pace data matters most. The car took significant rear damage; the driver, mercifully, took none. Alpine’s evening, at least, was salvaged by Colapinto at the other end of the garage.

On the slideAston Martin

There is struggling, and then there is whatever this is. Bottom two in FP1 with Formula 2’s Jak Crawford standing in for Fernando Alonso; bottom two again in FP2, the returning Alonso over 5.4 seconds from the pace and Lance Stroll — who also starts Sunday with a 10-place penalty — further back still. On a 7.004-kilometre (4.352-mile) lap, five seconds is not a gap. It is a different championship.

The Final Word

If Friday at Spa taught us anything, it is that 2026’s energy era rewards the adaptable: Mercedes for rewriting its car in three hours, Verstappen for banking laps while others planned them, Ferrari for playing a different deployment game entirely. Saturday brings final practice at 13:30 local time and qualifying at 16:00 — and for those on the wrong side of this list, the night shift has already begun.