2026 F1 General Discussion Thread

Some rumor page threw up " byd thinking about F1"

While I doubt it happening soon can definitely see it. F1 focuses more on electric. Reputation gain and exposure as their growth is slowing against the competition.

Saudis fighting to keep the Jeddah race on the calendar. Not sure how that works given the flight disruptions.

I think Formula E would be better for them. I still think its a pity that Neither HyundaI or KIA are in F1. Would love to see one of them in it.

I'd say they will just sponsor a team, Like Toyota with Haas.

yeh I listen to them too - I just never really expected good lads like Tom Clarkson trying to paper over shortcomings so much - albeit I agree things will settle down over the next few races.

Right now there’s some stark divides in the 11 teams - 3 teams in F1, 5 in a tight midfield F1.5, and 3 adrift in F1.9

Give me them five genuine overtakes from 70s -80s all day long.

Quote: F1 is exciting and not totally predictable at the moment. Ahh man come on. Russell top every session and only with a problem today he would of been pole for tomorrow aswell.

Confirmation

So far it's been like watching some people playing Mario Kart online, player gets a mushroom and surge forward before dying off.

F1 should be the pinnacle of racing, with teams and drivers pushing the limits but this is like a video game.

I'm torn on it. They needed to make cars smaller and slower overall, but I don't like the idea of cars reducing speed on straights. That said, if you switched on the channel as an outsider you'd probably find this quite exciting going by what the TV director shows you - and that seems to be who it's geared towards. It's a shift in target audience from movie goers to TikTok reelers.

I don't like having the wool pulled over my eyes though. Crofty will have to drop the 2020's rare overtake excitement and start acknowledging these as procedural position swaps. If they manufacture Britain 2022 for every race, the spectacle wears thin fairly quickly. I've also noticed a big reduction in on-boards at China.

FIA never would, but I think this new system is geared towards short term chaos over enduring races. If they were drawing this year's formula into a new sport from scratch, the weekend would consist of 3/4 sprint races instead of one endurance race. Similar to how Q1, Q2 & Q3 all reset the tension.

FWIW I thought DRS was a patheticly overpowered feature that we were conditioned to accept over time, I suspect it'll be the same here. I don't really have an alternative for overtakes TBH. That's what they want, but the nature of qualifying filters the car on pace to begin with.

this was a half decent race to watch, reminded me almost of the 90’s with the awful starts from some cars (verstappen once again), and the mechanical DNFs, we lost almost 1/3 of the field.

the TV direction is totally different this year, they don’t show any clipping, or in-car footage from the end of the straights. Loads of high angle trackside camera and heli/drones.

Only one race in the 7 weeks until May 1st.

Essentially when the battery runs out on a long straight and the car slows before the end of the straight, even with full throttle