Amid talk of the developing Formula 1 title battle between the Mercedes drivers, one exciting fight is brewing that has largely gone under the radar.

This is the battle for supremacy at the upper-end of the F1 midfield in 2026. Behind the usual suspects that make up F1’s big four teams, fifth place in the constructors’ championship is up for grabs.

Realistically, this is the highest honour anyone outside of Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull can hope to achieve this season. Last year it went the way of Williams, but the Grove-based outfit looks fairly helpless to defend its P5 after a nightmare start to 2026.

Alpine currently heads the unofficial midfield championship battle. The French outfit sits on 23 points, seven behind Red Bull - who enjoyed something of a resurgence in Miami - and five clear of nearest rivals Haas. A further four points back is Racing Bulls in seventh, with a nine-point buffer to Williams in eighth.

Miami marked a tale of contrasting fortunes for Alpine and Haas. For Alpine, it proved to be a breakthrough weekend for Franco Colapinto, who qualified inside the top 10 for both the sprint and grand prix and scored points on Sunday.

The seven-point haul (including Pierre Gasly’s P8 in the sprint) for Alpine was enough to see it leapfrog Haas into fifth place in the constructors’, with Colapinto celebrating his best-ever F1 result after being classified seventh in the grand prix.

"I think since I got to F1 it's been my most perfect weekend," the 22-year-old Argentine said after the race.

"I am very happy with the weekend, it's been executed really well. I think we maximised every session and we scored strong points. It's been a weekend for all of us to be very proud of and we'll try to get better in Canada.”

Things could have been even better for Alpine had Gasly not been taken out in dramatic style on lap six as he battled with Liam Lawson’s Racing Bulls for 10th place.

Such was Alpine’s strong performance in Miami, Gasly rued what he felt had been a “big missed opportunity” for the team.

Alpine was boosted by a substantial upgrade package that debuted in Miami. The Enstone squad introduced a new, lighter chassis and a series of aerodynamic upgrades across its A526.

The updates brought a clear performance step, enabling Alpine to continue its points-scoring streak following an impressive winter turnaround. Alpine has been additionally strengthened by taking on the class-leading Mercedes power unit.

“I hope that it’s going to be the same in Canada,” Gasly commented. “This weekend seems to be surprisingly good on our side compared to the rest of the midfield. Hopefully it’s not track specific.

“I think there will be more work to do over the next two weeks but that’s why I think it was quite important to capitalise on this good form and now we have to work and make sure we have this pace advantage in Canada.”

Why have Haas gone backwards?

In contrast, Miami proved to be Haas’ weakest showing of the season to date. It was a weekend to forget on home soil as neither Haas car scored points, and finished outside of the top 10 in every competitive session.

To make matters worse, Ollie Bearman was denied a points finish by the Williams pair of Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon, who came home ninth and 10th respectively.

Haas made a flying start to the season and was even the fourth-fastest team in China, where Bearman claimed a superb fifth and also scored points in the sprint as the team outpaced Red Bull and its midfield rivals on merit.

So what went wrong in Miami? Bearman largely put it down to Alpine making a step, while Haas stagnated, having brought no upgrades to its car.

The VF-26 is a solid all-rounder, and has been particularly strong in race trim. But it is clear Haas needs more load in high-speed after what Bearman described as being a “nightmare” qualifying in Miami.

"I think the true pace came out,” he said. “It was good at the start of Q1, but actually we were on quite a different run plan with others.

“I felt like we'd actually caught up a bit of a gap to Alpine, for example. But they only did one set of tyres and they showed their true pace in Q2 - and we were not in the battle with them.”

On the improvements Alpine has made, Bearman suspects Haas’ main rival has now found a cure for its biggest weakness.

"They had an issue in high-speed, and then it looks like they've sorted that, and they've brought a huge amount of upgrades for this event,” he explained. “We brought zero, so we were anticipating a tough weekend - that turned out to be the case.”

With 18 rounds still remaining, and the development race only set to intensity further, this is shaping up to be a hard-fought battle that will span the entire season.