Bahrain Grand Prix 2026 Malaysia Upgrades: Mercedes Bring Their Singapore Floor Early as Audi and Williams Go Quiet

The Bahrain Grand Prix 2026 Malaysia upgrades list published by the FIA runs to 14 declared changes across seven teams, and Mercedes account for seven of them. Floor board, floor leading edge, floor corner, diffuser, rear suspension, rear corner, rear bodywork. Everything from the front of the floor to the back of the car. Racing Bulls follow up their Baku front wing with a longer flap and add rear wing support parts. McLaren and Alpine both file cooling changes aimed past Sepang. Red Bull, Ferrari and Haas bring one item each. Audi, who brought the biggest package in Baku, declare nothing. Neither do Williams, Aston Martin or Cadillac.

Key Points: Bahrain Grand Prix 2026 Malaysia Upgrades

• Seven teams declare 14 changes for Sepang: Mercedes 7, Racing Bulls 2, McLaren 1, Red Bull 1, Ferrari 1, Haas 1, Alpine 1
• Mercedes rework the floor from front edge to diffuser, plus the rear suspension, rear corner and rear bodywork, after declaring nothing for Baku
• Every Mercedes item is filed as Performance, and three of them reference the car’s operating envelope
• McLaren bring a high cooling engine cover and Alpine trim the front drum exit, both aimed at the circuits coming up
• Ferrari’s single diffuser change is filed as not Sepang specific
• Audi, Williams, Aston Martin and Cadillac declare no updates

Reading the FIA List

Before every race weekend, each team files a car presentation submission with the FIA. It lists the new aero and bodywork parts coming to the track, what each one does and why. Setup changes aren’t on it. Neither are parts a team has already raced.

Baku’s list ran to 38 items, as covered in my F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 2026 upgrades piece. Sepang’s runs to 14. Half of those come from one team.

Three terms keep coming up. Local load means more downforce from one specific area, with no claim about the car’s total. Flow conditioning means controlling where the air goes and how cleanly it reaches the next part of the car. And the operating envelope is the full range of conditions the car runs through, speed and ride height included. Mercedes use that last one three times.

Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team

Nothing declared for Baku. Seven items for Sepang, all filed as Performance, four for local load and three for flow conditioning. Read them in order and every one of them ends in the same place: more load at the back of the car.

The Front of the Floor

The floor board comes first. It’s the section at the front of the floor, the first surface the air meets after it comes off the front tyres. Mercedes have reprofiled its horizontal elements and added a vertical slotted upper element. They say it improves the local pressure distribution and the flow to the rear of the car, and reduces separations at the extremes of the operating envelope.

Separation is when the air peels away from a surface instead of following it. Once it lets go, that surface makes less load. It happens most at the extremes of the envelope. Ride height at its lowest or highest, the slowest and quickest corners. Mercedes are going after the edges of that operating window, where the airflow is hardest to keep attached.

The floor leading edge sits alongside it. Reprofiled, with additional down-washing elements. Mercedes say they add local load and outwash, improving flow to the rear and increasing rear floor load. Outwash pushes air out, away from the car, while downwash sends it down onto the floor. Both decide where the air goes before the floor has to work with it.

The Floor Corner and Diffuser

Further back, the floor corner gets additional slots and reprofiled elements. The floor corner is the outer rear section of the floor, ahead of the rear tyre. Mercedes have re-optimised the slot arrangement to increase local load and improve flow into the diffuser, and through that, rear load.

Then the diffuser itself, filed under floor body. Reprofiled roof, sidewall and winglet. The diffuser is the upswept exit at the back of the floor, where the air that has travelled under the car expands and leaves. Mercedes claim increased local load and improved consistency throughout the operating envelope.

The Rear End

Three more items, all built around what the new floor sends backwards.

The rear suspension fairings are reprofiled, with the track rod and driveshaft camber redistributed. Track rod and driveshaft both run out to the rear wheel, and their fairings sit in the air leaving the diffuser. Mercedes say the change increases local load while improving how those fairings couple with the diffuser winglet and the rear drum furniture, the small aero pieces mounted around the rear brake drum.

Those rear drum winglets change too, filed under rear corner. Span and position change, with the chord re-optimised too. Chord is the front to back length of a wing element. Mercedes say they now work with the new fairings and improve rear tyre wake control across the operating envelope. The spinning rear tyre throws turbulent air into exactly the area the diffuser is trying to use, so controlling that wake protects the floor’s load.

Last, the rear bodywork. Reduced volume and an increased sideview ramp. Slimmer bodywork that slopes down more steeply towards the back. Mercedes say it increases downwash to the rear floor and rear drum, resulting in more load.

Floor board, leading edge, floor corner, diffuser, then the parts that sit in the air leaving it. Each change sets up the next.

Visa Cash App Racing Bulls

Racing Bulls brought a new front wing assembly to Baku. For Sepang, the same wing gets a new flap. A longer chord one, filed as Circuit Specific, Balance Range. More flap means more load the wing can make, and Racing Bulls say that meets the aero balance requirements for this circuit. Balance is the split of grip between the front and rear axles. Same wing, more front end available when the track asks for it.

The second item sits at the other end. Revised rear wing auxiliary components, the support parts around the rear wing. Racing Bulls say the improved design lets the rear wing perform more effectively and increases the efficiency of the load it generates. Efficiency in aero terms means load for the drag it costs.

McLaren and Alpine: Built for the Heat

Two teams, two cooling changes, and both look beyond this weekend.

McLaren file one item, a new coke and engine cover described as High Cooling Bodywork. Circuit specific, cooling range. The team say it’s designed to meet the high cooling demands of this and the upcoming circuits, aiming at increased cooling massflow. Massflow is how much air moves through the cooling system. More air through the radiators, more heat out.

In Baku, McLaren filed eight items. This time, one. After the big package in Azerbaijan, McLaren had already flagged a lighter weekend here.

Alpine go to the brakes. The front drum exit has been trimmed to increase brake cooling capacity, filed as Performance, Brake Cooling. Alpine say it improves thermal management for the upcoming high-demand tracks. The drum is the shroud around the brake disc, and the exit is where the hot air leaves. Trim it and more air gets through.

Neither team names a circuit beyond this one. Singapore comes next in the triple-header.

Oracle Red Bull Racing

One item, and it’s the floor again. Baku brought new floor body and diffuser geometry. Sepang brings a revised floor board, filed as Performance, Local Load.

Red Bull say the new board sits above the existing floor foot geometry and realises development work to extract more load locally while maintaining flow stability behind the front tyres. The same area Mercedes are working on. The front tyre wake is the messiest air on the car, and the board is the first part of the floor that has to deal with it. Red Bull want more load from it without losing stability.

Scuderia Ferrari HP

Ferrari declared nothing for Baku. For Sepang, one diffuser item. Development of the outboard winglet cascade element, filed as Performance, Local Load.

Ferrari state it’s not Sepang track specific, calling it a very localised development that gives additional downforce across the entire car operating envelope. A cascade is a stack of small winglet elements. This one sits on the outer edge of the diffuser. Small part. Filed as a general step, with no circuit attached to it.

TGR Haas F1 Team

Haas file an updated rear impact structure geometry. The rear impact structure is the crash structure behind the gearbox, and the bodywork on it sits in the air leaving the car. Filed as Performance, Local Load.

Haas say an additional rear impact structure device will be available on track, enabling targeted tuning of the car’s characteristics for this circuit. One more choice for the engineers across the weekend.

The Four With Nothing Declared

Audi, Williams, Aston Martin and Cadillac have no updates submitted for Sepang.

Audi brought 14 items to Baku, the biggest package on that list by a distance. Williams brought five, led by the new floor they’d been building towards. Cadillac filed three in Baku. Aston Martin filed nothing in Baku either.

None of the four give a reason in the submission. Teams still run parts introduced earlier in the season. This list only covers what’s new.

Coffee Corner Take

Mercedes have been on the back foot in development all season. It hasn’t mattered. Eleven wins from 15 rounds. Antonelli leads Russell 302 points to 236, and Mercedes sit 160 points clear of Ferrari in the Constructors’ Championship. Nothing declared for Baku, and Russell won it anyway. Now they turn up at Sepang with half the list.

Seven items, one direction. Three of them reference the operating envelope, and the floor board goes straight for its extremes, where the floor is more vulnerable to changes in ride height and airflow. A team 160 points clear is spending its development closing the gaps where the car drops off.

Sepang’s range of corners rewards a car with good load. Mercedes have leaned that way harder than anyone.

This package was built for Singapore. Sepang got squeezed into the calendar, so it arrives a race early. Mercedes now get a full weekend of running on their Singapore floor before they reach Singapore.

Red Bull and Mercedes both working on the floor board in the same weekend tells you where the fight is. Behind the front tyres, in the dirtiest air on the car.

Audi and Williams going quiet makes sense. Their packages landed in Baku, and both will be hoping the analysis they’ve done since turns into lap time here. Different circuit, same parts. That’s the test I’m watching. Audi sit eighth on 17 points, ten behind Haas. Williams are ninth on 12.

By the time the grid reaches Singapore a week later, Mercedes will already have a race of data on the floor they built for it.