Motorsport Debrief: Hamilton shows he means business at Spa

Hi, this is Motorsport.com’s Global Editor-in-Chief Charles Bradley and I hope you’re well – and hungry for news. Let’s take a high-speed look at what’s happened over the past 24 hours as the Belgian Grand Prix weekend kicked off at Spa-Francorchamps.

Never read too much into Friday practice times, but Lewis Hamilton looked in ominous form to me on day one of the Belgian Grand Prix.

Mercedes played its hand on Friday morning, bringing performance upgrades to its engines as it raises the stakes for the closing F1 races. Ferrari’s latest developments were revealed in plain sight on Thursday – a new third damper element at the front end, and front wing updates, as it tries to carve into Mercedes’ high-speed circuit advantage.

The battlelines have been drawn, and how will it play out from here? There’s only one way to find out: keep your eyes glued to Motorsport.com this weekend as the title endgame begins.

Drivers now queuing up to goad Kevin Magnussen

Perhaps Kevin Magnussen wants the entire grid to “suck my balls” as he’s now angered Sergio Perez in practice at Spa.

Just one race weekend after angering Nico Hulkenberg, Perez had only just let Magnussen past when he tried to get back ahead exiting the Turn 8 downhill hairpin – but Magnussen moved to the left and forced Perez to slow down.

An irate Perez told his team over the radio that "Magnussen is so dirty, always", and raised the incident in drivers' briefing. Asked by Motorsport.com if he thought Magnussen's move was intentional, Perez said: “Yes, he knew I was there because [he] had just overtook me.

“I don't know what he was angry about but I just don't think it's the way to react. We've seen Kevin has reacted that way a couple of times already.”

Honda fails to introduce 'Spec 4' engine at Spa

Honda letting down McLaren is nothing new, but it has at least admitted it in public this time – as it failed to meet its self-imposed development schedule, according to f1 boss Yusuke Hasegawa.

Hasegawa has revealed the Spa update, which it christened spec 3.5 and 3.6, was only half of the package it had hoped to introduce.

"We had planned to introduce 'spec 4' here but we failed, we didn't match our schedule," said Hasegawa. "We're halfway through our upgrade so we called it 3.5 and 3.6."

How many more decimal places it plans to go down in future is unclear, but perhaps McLaren chief Zak Brown summed it up best: “I don't think we've been satisfied all year.”