Formula One’s controversial 2026 regulations

Formula One – F1 – is widely regarded as the pinnacle of motorsport, 22 feats of technical excellence racing around the world as drivers push their cars to the limit in pursuit of glory.

At least, that’s what F1 is supposed to be. Under the 2026 technical regulations, however, the sport has turned into a game of Mario Kart, with push-to-pass overtakes, computer programming deciding the outcome of qualifying, and teams turning to the age-old technical trick of ‘switching it off and on again’ when things go wrong.

It would be an understatement to say fans are divided on the new regulations. Even before the season began in Australia, there were concerns about the quality of the overtaking, the sound of the cars, and whether these regulations upheld ‘true’ racing.

And the ‘hybrid’ part is pertinent, as although F1 cars have had electrical boost since 2016 (the ‘turbo-hybrid era’), the 2026 regulations brought radical changes to the power unit. The removal of the MGU-H (a battery component which harvested power from the turbo) and the switch to a 50-50 split between electrical and internal combustion power meant a rethink of the way F1 operates, prompted by a desire to make F1 more sustainable.

Changes to a sport people love are never uncontroversial; imagine how football fans would feel if suddenly teams could score half goals. Historically, any changes to F1’s technical regulations (particularly concerning engines) have never gone down well. 

When V10s were abandoned, F1 fans missed the noise. When the V8 was swapped for the V6 hybrid engines, fans complained about Mercedes’ dominance. Similar complaints are being made now, but the concerns with these regulations stretch far deeper than what noise the car makes (although this is a worry). 

Chief among the problems is the safety risks posed by the way the cars harvest power, with potentially massive differences in speed causing some terrifying accidents, as evidenced by Haas’ Ollie Bearman, who had a heavy crash at the Japanese Grand Prix when approaching the much slower Alpine of Franco Colapinto.

If one driver is entering a corner, lifting and coasting, and the car behind is using ‘overtake mode’, where drivers can push a button to unlock an extra +0.5MJ (Megajoules) of power, the closing speed can be monumental. This was noted by McLaren Team Principal Andreas Stella before the season began, but it has only now been widely noticed due to Bearman’s crash.

Another problem with the F1 regulations is the inauthenticity of the racing, due to the supposed ease of overtaking. Although superclipping – a method of recharging the battery –  is a technical necessity due to the importance of the battery, it has a noticeable impact on racing. Halfway down a straight section of track, there is an audible ‘clip’ to the sound produced by the car as it reduces its speed in order to harvest power.

This has been widely criticised by drivers, with McLaren’s Lando Norris saying, “It still hurts your soul when you see your speed dropping so much – 56 kph down the straight.” Fans are equally unimpressed. Forcing cars to slow down is the opposite of what the pinnacle of motorsport should be promoting.

The new technical regulations also allow overtakes far more easily than previously, with cars passing and repassing each other on the same lap. “Honestly, [during] some of the racing… I didn’t even want to overtake Lewis”, described Norris. It’s just that my battery deploys… I can’t control it. So, I overtake him, and then I have no battery left, so he just flies past. This is not racing, this is yo-yoing.” The idea that drivers are not entirely in control of their cars has produced a ‘computer says no’ racing, where driver inputs do not align with the preprogrammed engine settings and battery deployment, leading to the car doing the opposite of what the driver was expecting. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, for example, saw his sprint qualifying lap in China ruined by the engine switching on to a different setting due to Leclerc momentarily lifting off the throttle.

All this aside, we must appreciate that these regulations are an attempt to make Formula One more sustainable. It is no secret that motor racing is not the greenest sport in the world. Flying to 20+ countries to host a motor race is never going to be an environmentalist’s dream. Switching to biofuels and generating 50% of the car’s power from electricity is a step in the right direction. But these regulations are not only designed to protect the future of the planet, but also the future of the sport.

It may seem on the surface that F1 is doing extraordinarily well: Drive to Survive brought a wider fanbase, and the sport is more popular than ever. But, going into the 2026 season, F1 were facing a situation where there could be only two engine manufacturers (Mercedes and Ferrari) in the sport. The 2026 technical regulations were a compromise resulting from discussions between many engine manufacturers, from Honda to Porsche, to Audi and Ford, removing the costly MGU-H and making a raft of changes to encourage more manufacturers into the sport.

Such are the issues with the 2026 regulations that a summit of F1’s teams has been convened to discuss: this includes potential modifications to the rules to solve many of the problems outlined above, particularly those concerning safety. The primary solutions which have been suggested are changing the amount of energy which can be harvested through super-clipping: increasing this to the same amount as that which can be harvested through lifting and coasting, there would be no need to slow down prematurely, which would prevent the gap in closing speeds.

Alternatively, F1 and the FIA are considering reducing the amount of power which can be harvested entirely, bringing the level of harvesting down to 250kW or 200kW. Doing so would slow the cars down, raising the question as to whether fans would prefer slower, better racing, or faster cars, leading to racing that resembles the chaos of Mario Kart.

In a sport where speed is everything, the fact that F1’s governing body is even considering a move which would drastically slow cars down (with reports of this change adding a second per lap to drivers’ laptimes) shows how fundamentally flawed these regulations are. Drivers are unhappy, teams are unhappy, and, perhaps most concerningly for F1’s future, fans are unhappy.