Ferrari points to ‘Unbalanced’ Hypercar field after Le Mans defeat

Ferrari left searching for pace at Le Mans

Ferrari has pointed to an “unbalanced” Hypercar field as the central reason behind its lacklustre showing at the 2026 Le Mans 24 Hours, after the reigning three-time winner failed to challenge for the podium.

Mauro Barbieri, Ferrari’s endurance chief designer, stopped short of naming Balance of Performance directly, but his message was unmistakable. “I think it was clear already since the test day, maybe even before, that the field was unbalanced and that we were not among the top performing ones,” he said.

Barbieri: Ferrari ‘tried everything’

He said the team explored different set-up philosophies, tyre double-stints and triple-stints, stint extensions, full-push phases and varied tyre specifications depending on the time of day. None of it was enough to erase the deficit to the leading manufacturers.

“The gap we had versus the top three manufacturers was too big,” Barbieri said, while praising the drivers for pushing hard throughout the 24 hours and taking risks in traffic.

The #51 car’s race was largely clean apart from Pier Guidi receiving a drive-through penalty following contact with a Proton LMP2 car in the fifth hour. Ferrari’s view was that fifth represented the maximum available result.

Strategy options limited by lack of pace

Barbieri argued Ferrari could not replicate Toyota’s aggressive undercut approach because it did not have the pace to exploit clean air. Instead, Ferrari believed its best chance was to stay in the slipstream of rivals.

That plan also proved difficult to sustain. Barbieri said Ferrari was broadly competitive on top speed, but lost lap time mainly in slow corners. He placed Ferrari around fourth or fifth in the competitive order, close to Alpine but behind the cars that ultimately finished ahead.

The #50 Ferrari was delayed by a fire extinguisher issue before stopping on Sunday morning with a suspected electrical problem, while the #83 AF Corse customer entry recovered to seventh after a late splash-and-dash. For Ferrari, the conclusion was blunt: execution was strong, but the performance ceiling was not high enough.