ADRIAN NEWEY’S ‘STRANGE’ WARNING SHOULD PROMPT F1 INTO 2026 RETHINK

While 2022 was a mass overhaul of the chassis regulations, 2026 is focused on the engine side of things.

In an effort, which should be supported, to be more environmentally friendly and relatable to the outside world, the 1.6-litre V6 engines will run on sustainable fuels but it is not so much what is going in through the fuel nozzle that is the problem.

Alongside the new fuel, F1 has overhauled the battery within the car to give it three times the electrical power of the current generation. The MGU-K (Kinetic Motor Generator Unit) will triple the electrical power and produce around 350kW, a sharp increase of the 120kW of the current generation.

This all sounds very good from an ideas point of view but when it comes to the actual nuts and bolts of it, that is where the concern arises.

From 2026, 50 per cent of the total power output will be electrical and what that means is a much larger battery. While all the focus has so far gone into the engine, Red Bull’s chief technical officer Adrian Newey warned that there was not “much thought” put into how the chassis would be impacted.

The old adage of the tail wagging the dog applies here. Does an engine exist to power a car or does a car exist to house the engine? The 2026 regulations are starting to suggest it is the latter.

One of the first people to raise the alarm was Christian Horner who last year described the new setup as a “Frankenstein” car.

“One of the big impacts for 2026 is weight – you’re looking at pretty much a 30-kilogram swing on cars that are already approaching sports car type of weight,” Horner said.

“There’s some very positive things about 2026 and a sustainable fuel and so on is extremely positive.

“But I think that perhaps where we need to pay urgent attention before it’s too late is to look at the ratio between combustion power and electrical power to ensure that we’re not creating a technical Frankenstein which will require the chassis to compensate to such a degree, with moveable aero to reduce the drag to such a level that the racing will be affected.

“There will be no tow effect, there will be no DRS because effectively you’re running at that at all points in time, and that the combustion engine just doesn’t become a generator to recharge a battery.

“I think that could easily be addressed with just tuning the ratio between combustion and electrical power.”

Unfortunately for the sport, Horner’s comments were turned into a perceived political move with Toto Wolff suggesting Red Bull were worried about their first fully in-house engine.

“I think what frightens him [Horner] more maybe is that his engine programme is not coming along and maybe he wants to kill it that way,” Wolff said.

“You always have to question what is the real motivation to say something like that.”

Pretty soon, focus had gone from the point Horner made and instead discussion of if Red Bull was behind.

Regardless of whether the Red Bull Powertrains division is or is not on target, Horner does have a point and it is one that Newey suggested too.

“It’s certainly going to be a strange formula in as much as the engines will be working flat-chat as generators just about the whole time,” he told Motorsport.com.

“So, the prospect of the engine working hard in the middle of Loews hairpin is going to take some getting used to.”

Up until now, the battery has been used to accompany the combustion side of the engine but Newey is suggesting that from 2026, the ICE will be there to support the battery.

As well as the added intensity this will place on engines, there is also the question of the size. F1 cars have already been lamented for being too big and bulky and that is why circuits like Monaco increasingly look outdated. If the plans continue as they are, the cars will only get bigger meaning it is not just Monaco that will be a Sunday snooze fest.

PlanetF1.com recommends

Explained: The 2026 engine regulations set to seriously shake up Formula 1

F1 2026 driver line-up: Lewis Hamilton and five other drivers already confirmed for 2026

Max Verstappen has been another voice of concern and suggested the data he has seen from the sim suggests it is “pretty terrible.”

“I’ve been talking about that as well with the team, and I’ve seen the data already on the simulator as well,” he said. “To me, it looks pretty terrible.

“If you go flat-out on the straight at Monza, and I don’t know what it is, like four or five hundred [metres] before the end of the straight, you have to downshift flat-out because that’s faster. I think that’s not the way forward. But of course, probably that’s one of the worst tracks.”

That data was revealed a little more this week when Motorsport.com reported that the initial reports from teams’ tests have been very alarming and led to drivers unable to make it around corners under certain conditions.

While Red Bull have been leading the charge, they are not alone in their apprehension. Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur was more on the fence but even he admitted there was some concern.

“We are supposed to have a working group to be all on the same page about what could be the outcome of the current regulations,” Vasseur said in July.

“We have to make some assumptions, because it’s not really clear about the tyre grip, aero downforce, drag. You can do whatever you want today, if you say that the grip of the tyres is decreasing by 30 per cent.

“It means that we have to agree on the strategy. Probably the path of the regulation is going into the direction to keep the same size of the tyres, to do this, to do that, and to have a working group saying that plus or minus 5 per cent that the speed trace will be this one.

“Today, we are not there. For me, it’s quite [an] early stage to draw a conclusion when we are not able to have the same vision of what could be the speed trace.”

With just under two seasons to go before the new regulations, F1 and the FIA are at a crucial crossroads. The cost-saving measure of the new regulations may have enticed some heavy hitters to the sport but it seems as if we are now facing years of a formula that does not make for great F1 cars and F1 racing. The sport’s controllers need to act now before it is too late.

2024-04-16T09:41:17Z dg43tfdfdgfd