F1. On June 6th, the eve of Canadian Grand Prixthe International Federation has unveiled the first official draft regarding the single-seater guidelines 2026 which, rightly, is considered a new “era” for the highest category of motorsports. Just four years later, the new regulatory framework is defined by the team engineers themselves. The most complex challenge of recent decades has served its purpose, suggesting that the extent of the new concept of “agile car” will require an effort significantly greater than that of the 2022 which marked the return of wing car.
Yet another Copernican revolution will change the face of the cars, as the teams understood through their simulations that the second generation power units would not be able to provide the same performance as the current cars. The F1 of today, large and heavy, have a hybrid system with two motor-generators. As we know, however, from 2026 the MGU-H will be abolished as it is complex and expensive. THE team have enormous doubts about the new technical regulation issued by the technical management of FIA.
F1 2026: all the gray areas of an unclear regulation
Based on the new aerodynamic design, there will be a reduction in vertical load equal to 30% and at the same time a drop in drag (aerodynamic resistance to advancement, ed.) of more than 50%.. An aspect made possible by the introduction of active aerodynamics on the new F1 cars which could create large differences in performance despite the different interpretations of the teams. Through George Russellhead of the GPDA, the drivers have made it known that they fear that the single-seaters could be dangerously too fast on the straights.
A feature that the FIA will monitor carefully, to avoid exceeding limits beyond which serious safety risks may arise. The 30% load reduction was decided to make the single-seaters less fast in corners, in order to be more agile when changing direction. However, the small size of the bottom and the diffuser worries the engineers quite a bit from the various stables of F1 who will have to deal with single-seaters from grip significantly lower than the cars currently racing on tracks all over the world.
The technical director of the single-seater division of International Federation, Jan Monchauxhas opened up the possibility of reviewing appropriate downforce levels, as soon as i team have developed mature simulation models based on the current rationales defined in the regulatory body. Any evolution of the regulation regarding downforce cannot ignore the review of the current geometry of the single-seater floor 2026. Another major critical issue concerns the reduction in the weight of the single-seaters by 30 kg to reach the minimum weight of 768 kg.
Although this is not a weight that must necessarily be achieved by teamIn the 2022 there has been proof of how much it can cost in terms of performance a mass greater than the minimum permitted limit. It is estimated that an increase of 10 kg on single-seaters, in the new era of F1 it could correspond to a performance loss equal to three/four tenths of a second for each round. Second James Volwes, team principal of the historic stable Williamsalthough achievable, this objective could be extremely onerous.
Also the boss of the racing department of McLaren shows doubts. Andrea Stella, has several doubts about the effectiveness of the new hybrid turbo engines. The main concern of the original engineer of Orvieto is the insufficiency of the energy produced by theMGU-K and therefore not evenly distributed over the course of one revolution. In this sense, the possibility of making the fuel flow of the internal combustion V6 variable is being examined. to generate more power and balance any lower energy input from the hybrid component.
These are subtle changes to the regulation made public in August of 2022 which would not require invasive changes compared to the work that the power unit manufacturers are developing. Hypothesis that does not find support from Mercedes. The Austrian Toto Wolff does not want any type of change to be made to version 1.0 of the technical regulation on PU 2026. In reverse Christian Horner would like it. We are faced with what could become one of the many political disputes between the two in the coming months team principal Of F1.
Will F1 2026 remain the pinnacle of motorsport in terms of performance?
As indicated by the technical regulations 2026both in terms of the aerodynamic part and for the PU second generation, it is reasonable to expect single-seaters with completely unbalanced behavior between fast segments compared to mixed ones. From a performance point of view, what is gained on the straights with active aerodynamics will hardly compensate for the loss of performance when cornering. The concern is that there is a risk of reducing the gap between single-seaters F1 and those of F2 in the order of a few seconds, making the category vulnerable compared to other high-level series.
The business card of F1, through its numerous technological evolutions, has always been one: always being and in any case what we could define as the apogee of motorsport in terms of performance. Goal that second Nicholas Tombazisformer Ferrari driver now director of the single-seaters of the FIAwill continue to be the identifying character of the category even from 2026. The Greek supports it without any fear: the increase in aerodynamic load will be one of the easiest objectives for the drivers to achieve team thanks to the regulatory freedom that will be granted.
Last but certainly not least, there remains the issue of different settings that can be used throughout the session. The regulatory revolution risks disorientating the public with three modes of operation: X-Mode, Z-Mode And Override Mode. It took many years to digest fan the concept of DRS or the macroscopic architecture of turbo-hybrid power units. Making these new changes to the rules of the game could have negative effects precisely at the peak moment of polarity in the category.
Author and graphics: Roberto Cecere – @robertofunoat
Render: @Qvist_Designs
