After the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) released the draft 2026 Formula One technical regulations on Thursday, the team bosses certainly didn’t offer a hearty stamp of approval in the regularly scheduled Friday press conference at the Canadian Grand Prix.
Instead, they offered a clear and definitive “needs work” verdict.
The 2026 cars will be lighter — a 30 kilogram reduction in minimum weight to 768 kg; they’ll be shorter — a 20-centimetre reduction in wheelbase to 3.4 metres; and they’ll be thinner — a 10cm reduction in width to 1.9m. The cars will also feature active aerodynamics, with movable front and rear wings.
At first blush, many in the paddock felt the regulations would make the car faster in a straight line but slower in corners.
“I think we are quite far away still from the final [regulations] and I think it’s now up to all stakeholders to discuss and work on possible issues in a constructive way, rather than using the media to try and put something forward,” said Aston Martin team boss Mike Krack. “I think we will be able to iron out all the issues that are still there.”
That said, the team bosses also expressed support for the governing body’s objectives with the regulations at “a high level,” but agreed that the draft circulated by the FIA definitely fell short of what they expected to see.
“I think if we meet those objectives, we’re going to have F1 in a good shape,” said McLaren boss Andrea Stella. “But we need to make sure that when it’s the time of implementation, we actually deliver a product that meets those targets and objectives.”
For his part, Williams team boss James Vowles identified two concerns with the regulations.
“First and foremost, there’s the aerodynamic side, so what we’re doing with either freedom or physically how fast the cars will be,” he said.
“The second side is where we are on weight and I’ve been vocal already a few weekends ago. I put it from Williams’ perspective, but I don’t think anyone will hit that weight target particularly. It’s going to be incredibly difficult and I think that needs reviewing because, as someone who spends their life going through marginal gains, taking weight out of a car, it’s not a fun thing to do.”
The FIA reacted quickly with a press conference of its own on Saturday in Montreal, where its single-seater director Nikolas Tombazis insisted that the regulations released Thursday should serve as a starting point.
“We have full expectation to make some steps up in performance and that’s exactly why we set the bar reasonably low to start with, so we can build up on that in collaboration with the teams,” he said. “To increase the downforce on these cars is actually quite easy, if you have the regulatory freedom, and that’s exactly the step we want to take.”
Nevertheless, these regulations will go to the World Motor Sport Council for approval, which the FIA expects to happen June 28.
Canadian Lance Stroll welcomed the new regulations, making the cars lighter, but hoped for more.
“Unfortunately, it’s only 30kg — I would like to see 300kg,” the Aston Martin driver said. “The cars are like boats, so 500kg or 600kg cars would be really cool.”
Stroll also praised the move away from ground effects, as it should bring some relief to the drivers by eliminating some of the health concerns, but also expressed worry that the new regulations would mute performance too much.
“In general, you have to drive these cars super stiff, super close to the ground; I don’t like this direction that the F1 took and it didn’t help to follow the other cars either, so it didn’t really do what we wanted it to do,” he said. “But I think it would be sad if we saw F1 cars go slower than F2 cars. I hope we can think about all that and not lose five or six seconds of performance in F1 cars.”
