Four Leaders, One Champion

Leclerc and Neubauer won the opening race at Brands Hatch. Feller and Buus took over the lead by winning Race 2, then shared it with Charles Weerts and Kelvin van der Linde after Misano Race 1. Weerts and van der Linde won both Misano races and led through Magny-Cours. Daniel Juncadella led after Zandvoort Race 1. From Zandvoort Race 2 onwards the lead belonged to Feller and Buus.

Going into Barcelona they had 59 points, with Leclerc and Neubauer on 53.5 and Juncadella on 53. Feller and Buus finished second in Race 1 while the #50 failed to score, and that settled it: their lead of 18.5 points was more than the 17.5 still available.

• ◆Points come from SRO's official Sprint Cup standings, race by race, so every total here matches the official table.
• ◆Scoring: the top ten in each race score 16.5, 12, 9.5, 7.5, 6, 4.5, 3, 2, 1 and 0.5, and both drivers of the pole car score 1 point. We recomputed every race from the classifications and matched the official table to the half-point.
• ◆One exception: Barcelona's second qualifying session was cancelled because of a severe rain warning, and the Race 2 grid was set from second practice. The #69 Emil Frey Ferrari started from pole, but no pole point was awarded because no qualifying took place.
• ◆Guest cars: the Razoon #914 Porsche finished fourth in Zandvoort Race 1 but was not eligible for points, so every car behind it scored one place higher.
• ◆Crews, not drivers. Most cars kept the same pairing all year. The exception is the #3 2Seas Mercedes, which Juncadella shared with Jules Gounon until Magny-Cours and with Chris Lulham after it, so we follow Juncadella.

By scoring the maximum whenever they scored at all. Feller and Buus finished in the points in only five of the ten races, but those five were two wins and three second places. They added three pole points, more than any other crew. AF Corse's #50 scored in eight races and still finished second.

The #80's five blank races came from a power-steering failure, two penalties, an early tangle and one race where it started 21st. We looked at those in detail in Fast on Saturday, Invisible on Sunday.

Yes. We re-scored the same ten race results under two other systems. SRO's scale pays a win 37% more than second place, so a crew that wins often can afford to miss races. Under an F1-style scale, which is just as steep, Feller and Buus still win, but by one point. Under a flat 10-to-1 scale that rewards finishing in the points every weekend, Leclerc and Neubauer are champions by seven points.

Neither result is the “real” champion. The points system decides what kind of season wins, and in 2026 it rewarded the fastest car over the most consistent one.

After Magny-Cours Race 1 Weerts and van der Linde led the championship on 50 points. In the five races that followed they scored 5 more. At Magny-Cours Race 2 the #32 lost all its qualifying times for an overboost infringement. It then went pointless through both Zandvoort races, and two minor placings at Barcelona left it fifth.

That collapse still left the #32 as the car that got most out of its pace all year, gaining almost ten places per race from its average grid slot. Its problem was the second half of the season, not its race craft.

With depth. Team WRT finished on 86.5 points, 12.5 clear of Lionspeed GP, and was one of only two teams to score in all ten races. Only a team's best car scores, so WRT's four-car entry gave it four chances every race. Three different cars delivered its best result at least once.

The #32 led the way five times, Valentino Rossi and Max Hesse's #46 three times, and the Silver Cup #30 of Matisse Lismont and Ignacio Montenegro twice, including second overall at Magny-Cours Race 2. Lionspeed ran a single Pro car until it added a Silver Cup car for the last two rounds, and scored in seven races.

Seven different cars won the ten races, from six manufacturers: Ferrari won three, Porsche and BMW two each, and Mercedes-AMG, McLaren and Audi one each. Two races were won outright by Gold Cup cars.

• ◆Garage 59's #58 McLaren (Thomas Fleming and Louis Prette) won Zandvoort Race 1 from second on the grid, the first Gold Cup car to win a Sprint race this year.
• ◆Tresor Attempto's #99 Audi (Dylan Pereira and Alex Aka) won Barcelona Race 1 from 14th, after wet qualifying scrambled the grid.
• ◆Emil Frey's #69 Ferrari won two of the last three races and finished the season strongest of all.

The 2026 Sprint Cup was close, open and decided as much by the scoring system as by the racing. Lionspeed won it with the fastest car and a points scale that forgives missed races. AF Corse would have won under a flatter scale, and WRT won the teams' title by having more cars in the fight than anyone else. If Emil Frey carries its late-season form into 2027, there may be a fifth name on next year's list of leaders.