BackHe lost his job. Now he’s having F1’s wildest season.
Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz found out he would be replaced by Lewis Hamilton next season. He has responded with an inspired run that includes winning a Grand Prix right after an appendectomy.
PremiumMIAMI—Somehow, a sudden bout of appendicitis during a trip to Saudi Arabia was only the second unluckiest thing to happen to Carlos Sainz this Formula One season. Much more uncomfortable was the misfortune that Sainz, a 29-year-old driver from Spain, suffered only a couple of months earlier.
He was fired by Ferrari.
Back in January, the team informed him that the 2024 season would be his last in the famous red car, because it needed to make room for its latest signing, seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton. The news didn’t just sting. It also put Sainz in one of the most awkward positions in sports. He was expected to race in 24 Grands Prix this year for a team that was cutting him loose.
“That was a tough spot to be in," Sainz says. “But I just took it pragmatically and said, ‘OK, I’m going to give it my best.’"
Now, five races into his strange final season at Ferrari, it’s safe to say that no F1 driver is having a more interesting year—for better and for worse. On the bright side, he’s racing as freely as ever. Last month, he pulled off a minor medical miracle by winning in Australia, less than three weeks after having his appendix removed. The victory means that in a spell of utter Red Bull dominance, Sainz remains the only non-Red Bull driver to win a Grand Prix since the start of 2023.
Slightly less exciting: Sainz has no idea where he’ll be racing next season.
That’s because Hamilton’s impending move stuck Sainz at the center of a massive reshuffle. Around half of the 20 drivers on the grid started this season without contracts for next year and their fates depend in part on where Sainz ends up—he has been linked with potential moves to Mercedes, Red Bull, and Sauber. Though his aggressive style behind the wheel and three career victories make him the best driver available, he is no closer to announcing a decision.
Sainz’s manager (who also happens to be his cousin), Carlos Oñoro Sainz, said that he has never seen a driver market like it. Formula One’s sweeping new technical regulations for 2026 only scramble the picture more.
“No one has a crystal ball," he adds.
This isn’t the first time Sainz has been treated like a second fiddle. The son of a champion rally driver and a go-kart wunderkind since the age of four, Sainz entered Formula One alongside Max Verstappen at Toro Rosso, Red Bull’s feeder team, in 2016. But it was Verstappen who earned the promotion to Red Bull. By late 2017, Sainz was left to try his luck at Renault.
That stint didn’t last much longer. Sainz lost his seat to Daniel Ricciardo in 2018 and moved on to McLaren.
“I’ve been through a lot," Sainz says. “I know what it takes to adapt quickly to a new car and a team. And I know it takes more time than what people believe."
That’s what made Ferrari’s decision so galling. In his fourth season with the team, Sainz felt he had found his groove and was more than keeping pace with his teammate, Charles Leclerc. Since the start of 2023, Sainz has posted two race wins and six podium finishes, compared with zero wins and eight podiums for Leclerc. But Ferrari’s mind was made up. So after the team broke the news to him, Sainz reacted the only way he knew how: he floored the gas pedal in every way.
He ramped up his physical training to become the fittest he’s ever been. He took to his bicycle and tortured himself on the steep hills behind his Monaco home, even riding with two-time Tour de France champion Tadej Pogacar.
Then, once the racing began, Sainz drove his Ferrari to the absolute limit. Intentionally or not, he was proving a point to the team that seemed so comfortable dispensing with his services. Sainz beat Leclerc to reach the podium in Bahrain and outraced Leclerc again for a podium finish in Japan. Then last month in China, Sainz didn’t shy away from a wheel-to-wheel showdown with his teammate.
“He’s fighting more [against] me than the others," a displeased Leclerc said afterward.
Yet nothing was more impressive than Sainz’s battle against his own appendix.
When the searing pain hit him shortly before the Saudi Grand Prix in April, Sainz believed it was food poisoning. Only after it dragged on for 48 hours did he rush to hospital in Jeddah for an emergency appendectomy. No one could tell him how soon he might squeeze himself back into an F1 cockpit and resume throwing himself around corners at 150 miles an hour.
“I was in bed and I couldn’t move for a week," he says.
Still, he traveled to the next race in Australia anyway, where he continued devoting every waking moment to his recovery. By the time the race weekend rolled around, a bandaged-up Sainz decided to give it a whirl.
Jumping in the car without expectations, or an appendix, should have removed any stress—merely showing up was crazy enough. But after gritting his teeth through practice and picking up second place in qualifying, he suddenly felt like he could do more.
“As soon as I started to feel like I could race," Sainz says, “the pressure was exactly the same."
And if he learned one thing at Ferrari, it’s how to deal with pressure, a lesson that Sainz plans to carry with him long after he leaves. As any F1 veteran can attest, driving the car with the prancing horse on the front invites the sort of scrutiny that Italians normally reserve for pasta sauce.
“Once you jump into Ferrari colors…representing a country like Italy," Sainz says, “it makes you more mature, makes you a stronger driver."
Write to Joshua Robinson at Joshua.Robinson@wsj.com
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