No, math is good! It's the language we use for describing, defining and predicting physics. It's important and interesting and helpful even (especially?) when it's almost like you planned it out.
Everytime F1 significantly changes the rules it makes F1 less competitive. The smaller teams don't have the money and resources to redevelop as quickly as Bull, Merc, and Ferrari. So we are looking at another crap season in F1 where one or 2 teams win everything and the other teams just crash out of every race. The whole sport needs to either change completely or just go away.
Something in me dislikes whenever rules are put down, that limit efficiency... like the aero efficiency limit in LM, removal of MGU-H, and even a cap on recovered energy per lap
The MGU-H is a highly complicated and thus, very expensive piece of kit. Audi / Porsche / VW did not want to get involved in F1 if the MGU-H remained. All the f1 teams (I believe) are quite happy to be losing this complicated costly part
I agree it's mostly for cost but also partly to "improve the sound" of the cars. In the current regs, a lot of the "racecar sound" is attenuated by the energy recovery because those sound pulses are essentially wasted energy. Plus without the MGU-H, we'll get awesome blowoff sounds!
idk why that rule about limiting the cars' energy recovery rate is even there? if there's all that power in braking being left on the table, especially as the ICE becomes less powerful and the PU relies more on the electric motor, why the hell can't they take full advantage of that energy regen?
Yes the teams all agree the ICE will be used as a generator for a fair portion of the laps a (at the end of the straights) that is the only way they can make use of the 8.5Mj of energy store per lap.
I don't know how it was in the past with rulemaking but now it is a game of keeping the big players happy. MGU-K? Higher efficiency but No, to complicated. 4WD? No, Audi will have an advantage due to LMP1. 11th team? No, they will take our market share. You just have to hate politics in sport. So many compromises.
I think it's the MGU-H they are getting rid of. Which is weird since VW just came out with one for the new 911. But yeah agreed, It's getting to the point where a Porsche road car will have more tech on it than an F1 car, their new Active suspension is pretty awesome too.
@@tHebUm18the other big teams are worried that Audi will come in and dominate the field with the experience they had with their lmp1 cars. Which absolutely destroyed the WEC for better than half a decade. Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren cannot be embarrassed by a new team. Instead of trying to keep up with the technology, they’d rather the technology no exist to compete with
They are also going to have narrower tires in the new regs, which is where some of the reduced drag comes from, but it will also make corner’s slower due to loss in mechanical grip
yeah I don't think we need math to understand less rubber reduces grip far more then the aerodynamic benefit... but I'd be curious if that could be calculated.
@@flip_moto I wouldn't be so sure. Williams claimed the narrower tyres in 1993 made their car faster overall. That was a much more significant reduction in tyre width than for 2026 too.
@@flip_moto the width of the tyre is a highly unusual concept as its heat management rather than contact patch. coeficent of friction is identical so for an identical compound narrower tyres would be faster due to less weight and less drag. however the tyres have the say 100kw of energy across 40cm v 30cm. energy will be heat. so the skinny tyres will blister, that causes a harder compound to be needed. and the harder compound is what looses time. the same concept can be used on snow. there are 2 options. so much surface area that you grip anyway, or studded tyres that focus really high pressure meaning you have grip.
@@somethingfunny6867 Your thinking of classroom physics. In the real world the drag coefficient goes up with wider tyres since the road isnt perfectly flat and the tyre isnt either. They have bumps/ridges that can interlock with each other. Wider tyres means there are more bumps/ridges the tyres can latch on to.
@@Polla9203 no thats not how it works at all. the softer compounds used can go deeper into the micro bumps and ridges. and that is what gives more grip.
Juan Pablo Montoya said in an interview. "If we had the tires of the current F1 cars, we would rip out our heads off". It was just pure power limited by mechanical grip
I've watched the WEC at the peak of LMP1, where the max. amount of energy allowed per lap was really restrictive. It's not going to be that much of "they look sooooo much slower", but rather "we can see how much faster they *could* go".
In comparison, the Porsche 919 LMP1h, could recover 8MJ per lap, and had similar ICE and electrical power to the upcoming 2026 cars. Even tho the Porsche had the same "average" energy as the 2MJ recovery and 4MJ cars (those cars were allowed more fuel per lap, given they had less recovered energy), Porsche were able to choose where to deploying it. And mathematically it was much faster to explode all of that energy at the beginning of every straight so that the car would go from 120kph to 260kph in like 3 seconds, and then the car will rely on the ICE only. The electric boost was also handy at creating huge speed differences on the straights depending on deployment to help overtake. However, later, the electric deployment was pulled back a bit to 400hp, and the cars would race more evenly.
@@thurbine2411in theory even if you use your deployment to pass, they can use to defend… or wait till later in the lap to get you back. Track position becomes less important but overall pace and tire grip is more important.
LMP1H from 2012 to 2016 is peak motorsport. I wish F1 would use those regs for engine minus diesel I think F1 should limit the hybrid power to 240~260 max so they have energy after every corner. After that only the override function works. And also keep downforce levels similar to what they have now so the movable front wing wont be necessary and the cars won't be much slower. And maybe they could carry less batteries that way. But the whole idea abt going till 345kph with the hybrid seems like a wet dream. There isn't enough energy for that.
@@Willbrse I wouldn’t say that slower cars than today especially at start of very new regs would be that bad. I agree that it would be better to not have to have active aero. Think one of the most important things would be to have the cars smaller so you can take more different lines as well as giving more room for different setups and developments of the cars
The most exciting eras of F1, CanAm, Group B etc has been when teams have found new innovations or loop holes in the rule book. The sport is inching further and further away from that and for teams to have an ability to create unique and innovative cars. I wish they opened up the rules for innovation and creativity and set a handful of very limiting parameters that the teams had to work with. Like a very constricted fuel supply but any engine configuration they decide on. Active aero but a very limited body work area, a 3D-scanner could easily check the area number. Not regulate tire sizes and let more tire suppliers in to the sport. And Id love to hear what people actually working in F1 thinks. Or someone who used to work there and has nothing to loose by speaking freely.
Yeah I don't get this. At first I was like cool. They have more energy for their batteries. Motors are amazing, and they should. The teams will find the best ways to get more from the motors now. Then they start putting limits on everything about the system while using less powerful fuel... The sport seems to be losing its identity. It needs less rules. More unique designs. Cap the money somehow if that means only richer teams will win.
Or at least a bit more room for different designs. Engines would probably be the same for most cars even if the choice was free but it just feels like the current regs don’t allow for much difference in setup or aero. All cars have to run super low to be fast and rules are very strict in how things should look
@@dianapennepacker6854 I agree that the poorer teams should get a shot at scoring points. But looking at the history of the sport, when theyve been trying to restrict spending in certain areas. The teams with bigger funds can throw more money on other areas of development rendering those caps counterproductive. Brawn won a championship cause they found an innovative loophole and they pursued it cause they were desperately underfunded and hungry to survive. Looser regulations leaves more room for idea based innovation and great ideas are usually cheaper than incremental R&D. And if you ask me. Innovation was what F1 used to be about and what Id like to see more of.
@@bodanerius you'd then need BOP to ensure close racing. never forget that open regs always create large gaps between cars / teams. if you want closer racing, regulating strict limits on everything is one way to do it along with a budget cap. At the moment F1 has the tightest bunched field in its history. how that isn't exciting for anyone is beyond me. tbh i'm not looking forward to the '26 changes purely because one team probably gonna dominate
This is a really great video. There’s quite a bit going on here, but you just communicate it all so well. It can’t be easy deciding the level of detail to go into for a video like this, but you do a very good job and seem to always get the balance just perfect (in my opinion)!
A couple of thoughts on this Jason. The current rules allow for a maximum recovery of 2MJ per lap from the MGUK to the battery and 4MJ per lap deployment from the battery to the MGUK. But the energy transferred between the MGUH and the battery and between the MGUH and MGUK is unlimited. At most tracks the cars cannot recover the full 2MJ per lap under braking alone. They have to burn fuel at part throttle to boost the recovery. For 2026 the energy recovered per lap is 8.5MJ but the deployment is unlimited. Meaning that the recovered energy by the MGUK to the battery is over 4 times the amount in the current rules. The 2026 rules have specific rules about recovering energy when the driver is on throttle. At part throttle there is a rule that limits fuel flow (article 5.4.5) to, presumably, limit energy recovery. This means that the ICE will be making more power in some corners than would normally be the case. For example, the hairpin at Monaco, where the engines barely make power, the 2026 ICE could make as much as 120kW, which would be used for energy recovery. In article 5.14.8 the rate at which the PU output when at maximum power demand (ie full throttle) is reduced is defined. It also specifies that the maximu reduction is 450kW and that the MGUK must stay above -100kW (ie no more than 100kW of recovery). It is likely, IMO, that the cars will reach the end of a long straight with only 300kW, not 400kW, if only for a second or two. Most tracks have 10-15s of heavy braking, which would give the 2026 car roughly 1/2 the allowable energy recovery. The rest will have to be from fuel burning, so the minimum fuel is probably going to be ~90kg, maybe more. Using the power numbers in your video, and by the rule 5.4.8, the 2026 cars will have more power than the 2024 cars up to 304kph. Basically, IMO, the 2026 PUs are too heavy for their power (they are much the same weight as the current PU), and the style of ERS is more suitable for stop-start commuter traffic than high speed race cars. I wonder what the lap times would be without the ERS and the maybe extra 100kg of weight it causes.
No that's not right, the MGU-H does not recover energy at part throttle. It does it at wide open throttle. They get just under 200 bhp from the MGU-H, and there's no way you'd get that from part throttle.
the maximum start fuel will be 70kg by rules. fuel flow rate i dont know. but the start fuel load is down 30% its quite a clever strategy. finally got me to understand what max was saying a year or so ago about cars breaking on the straights.
@@jaredscott4829 You misunderstand. In current F1 they recover energy by burning fuel in the ICE to run the MGUK as a generator when at part throttle. That will also need to be the case in 2026.
One thing I noticed is that whenever they talk about speed they mean in qualifying trim. I always thought that the total time over race distance (305km) or fastest lap of the race is a better indicator of an F1 car's "speed". That's why the 2004 cars held records for so long and still do. That's without DRS or slick tyres.
You do know that thouse cars could push with an empty fule, needing to drive qualy times. While modern cars just cruse around to save the tires and only rarely push in the race when they under pressure, and even than they have a full fule. Only in qatar they where pushing qualy times every lap because they needed to pit anyways because of the fia and there the drivers nearly passed out.
Cool. You lift and coast and you get overtaken. The question is were the lap times slower or faster than 2020 or 2004 or 1994 at Silverstone last weekend? Does anyone know or care?
I’m even more pessimistic. He hasn’t included a critical issue. With 30% less downforce, corner exit speed will be a lot slower, making his straitaway analysis overly optimistic.
I mean the medium-slow corner exit speed wont be that big of a concern, theyll be a bit lighter, with a tiny bit skinnier tyres but the torque of the electric engine will really help launch it out. In slow corners downforce isnt much
And also we dont know how that 30% adds up maybe they calculated it 50/50% from z and x mode, could be that in normal mode it will only lose 10-15percent
I’d recommend you look back at the 6 wheeled cars, ones with double wings, the tusks, etc. F1 rules changing force teams to innovate which is the primary part of the sport. All the money is in constructors, drivers is the glory. F1 has always been about hundreds of the world’s best engineers pushing the limits on R&D.
Agreed, I've been watching since 89. The paddle shifter was the first gimmick that helped start to throw the sport off course but it really lost its way when all the electronics, computers, passing and driver aids came into play. These days race cars resemble less of an actual car and more of a rolling computer with an engine.
The thing is if they allow unlimited development for the ultimate expression of a racecar, we'd end up with weird stuff like the Red bull prototypes in Gran Turismo. Those racing is a sight to behold, not in a good way.
that top speed isn't hit at very many tracks, monza, mexico, baku is where they can hit 360 - 370. most of the time they are at 340 or less at their fastest point.
@@andrewlutes2048 Good question, got me looking. Mostly about 340 kmh expected through traps in Baku. But for science in 2016 Bottas reached 378 kph on straight and 366.1 through the the traps
They did that for a while, but at that time, it was the most dangerous sport in the world. Either watch the old races or build your own death cart lmao
Why would they make f1 teams go slow intentionally to charge a battery? I think hybrids are great but that just sucks. The whole point of f1 is that these are the fastest cars in the world. If they want small fast light and efficient, why not: turbo v8 with a little electric power from breaking and exhaust used to give boost to the engine? And then use renewable fuel.
I hate how contrived the rules are. If they want to slow cars down, just limit the engine/battery size. Beyond that teams should be left to exploit the hardware to the maximum possible.
One remark: In order to regenerate 8.5 MJ the electric motor needs tobrake for around 20 seconds. Problem is that F1 doesn't brake for 20s during a lap and therefore will have less than 8.5MJ available. One option is to let the engine produce more power when it is not required, halfway a corner for instance, and regenerate at that point. This will require more fuel then.
@@TheFPSPower It's what will happen though. You are allowed up to 30% torque from the engine to charge the battery while the driver has zero throttle on. The 70kg fuel limit is very unlikely to happen, most likely it will be 100kg again and used to generate electricity.
The current cars can't regenerate their allowed 4 MJ per lap either. They can use that 4 MJ from the battery when they need to, and then need to recover it, usually over multiple laps. So they don't have 4MJ of electric power available each lap either. My guess is that on most tracks, these cars might be able to barely recover 4.5 MJ, and use the rest 4 MJ from the battery, for 8.5 MJ total usage on a push lap. because I don't see why there would be a 8.5 MJ per lap battery usage limit if they could never reach that anyway because the storage delta is only 4 MJ and they can't recover enough for the rest of the per-lap limit. If all that is true, then they can almost recover the battery to full in a single recovery lap after doing that push lap, which IMO could be a good thing. Or keep using the battery power in a balanced manner where they recover as much as they use.
Formula 1 as gone back to Bernie Ecclestone mindset and politics. The current F1 cars that are the best at following each other through corners for more than 15 years was the vision from Chase Carey , Sean Bratches and Ross Brawn. F1 needed Ross Brawn because he was afraid of the team principals nor was he was trying to curry favor to secure his career. The trio was the best leadership team for Formula 1. You wouldnt have Netflix, freedom of social media, cameras going inside the garages, tech time to talk about the sticky uppy bits, we wouldnt have none of that. Sadly F1 greatest weakness is politics where persons are put in power based on the benefits of outside stakeholders and not on their ability to lead sport to become greater.
These wide giant cars are not the best for racing. Yes, they can follow better than the 2017-21 cars, but they didn't change enough. They needed to be closer to the size of the 2012-16 cars. They needed a higher rear wing which would have provided more visibility for the drivers while reducing the turbulence at the rear, and a slightly smaller front wing not the huge plow they put on. The 18inch tires require more energy to spin up and slow down. Ross Brawn and Pat Fry gave us an extension of the 2017 rules. They are better, but not good enough for wheel to wheel racing. Hopefully the smaller cars even with their power limitations will provide better wheel to wheel racing.
@@uncleelias Ross Brawn said it himself that these car were a step in the right direction not the perfect solution. He said before he left they were improvements to be made. The 2026 regs should have been a evolution but not another revolution such as 2014 and 2017
I'm a little bit dissapointed by the new rules. I hoped they would unleash the engineers at energy recovery and reuse. Like give them 240-360kW MGU-K, keep the MGU-H, and let them recover and deploy as they like. But this would probably favor the best engineering team too much. The shorter wheelbase will even further decrease the cornering speed, as with a shorter leaver you reach the maximum force the contact patch can support sooner. Tire strategy will also be interesting. As we take load of in terms of weight and downforce i expect only one stop at any dry race.
Wouldn't be great if the FIA just gave dimension, weight and tire restrictions and allowed teams to develop energy production in any means possible? Its near spec racing at this point.
@@flip_moto It depends on who you ask. When they started the hybrids it was slightly loose in terms of the MGU-H and HV battery as it was uncertain at the time how much the battery would suffer from the environment in the car. That alone gave Mercedes a huge advantage in the early years of their dominance. Awesome for engineers, racing fans hated it, and the sponsors of other teams didn't like it either. The current regulations make LMP1 engines viable and favor Audi, Ford, Porsche, and Toyota to enter F1. Audi is confirmed, Porsche couldn't agree with Red Bull so Ford will enter, and Toyota asked for sure but we don't know as they keep their business clean as usual.
@@somethingfunny6867 you don't necessarily need to get to the front. They break at slightly under 2000kW only 120kW of it can be recovered. Without whiteboarding, I guess the rear axle can handle up to 500kW under braking. So they could 4x their recovery if they want to. With the front, they need a system that can handle about 4 MJ per hard braking point.
@@MrHaggyy whilst you are correct at 200mph by the time you are at 150mph the initial energy flow halfs, and grip halfs. by 7150mph you are limited by car energy and grip. 200mph down to 70 is about 0.5Mj around a lap you might get 4 of these. and recover no more than 2Mj/lap. with the new rules you might get another half a Mj/lap
This video definitely represented what I like best about your channel. It even included an awesome whiteboard presentation! Looking forward to the next one!
8:45 but currently the energy that goes directly from MGU-H to MGU-K (compound mode) is unlimited, it is only energy that goes through the battery that is limited per lap
From the moment they started talking about removing the MGU-H I kept trying to tell people that physics won't allow the cars to be faster. If you make the cars less massive, they recover less energy. If you make the regenerative motors (MGU-K) bigger, you spend more energy accelerating. This upcoming new PU was proposed as a unicorn. Additionally, this new fuel is also a unicorn in terms of efficiency in manufacturing it. This is what happens when the oil barons are running the FIA. The new PUs will also not save money as I expect them to be less reliable.
@@jonathansmith7306 Where do you think synthetic fuels come from? Just because they are in theory "renewable", doesn't mean that oil isn't used in the production process. Think about all the equipment involved, trucks, tractors, plastics, everything runs on oil, no one is worried that oil is somehow going to become irrelevant. That's also why oil companies are one of the largest investors in renewables, they know that producing all the wind turbines (out of plastic), installing them (using fuel) and then having to cover the downtime (gas turbines) doesn't reduce oil consumption or price AT ALL. It might eventually reduce it in decades, but at that point they will have invested everything into renewables, it's pure politics.
lift and coast is also a common thing in f1 since a lot of years. its nothing new that driver go of the throttle early before a corner to use less energy and recuperate more
Just because it's been common for a number of years because of poor regulations doesn't mean it's not a bad thing. It's going to get even worse in 2026 and be even more of a blight on the sport.
@@EngineeringExplainedGiven that it seems unlikely that the battery can ever be fully charged up by regen, if the battery charge had been part of parc ferme, it could have opened up a new strategy of not pushing as hard in quali to have more charge at the start during a race. As you stated, Ferrari could be expected to nail this type of strategy.
FANtastic. That was such fun, following your logic there. I wasn't following too close, of course, but --like MM8436 said--I'll be looking for the followup in 2026. Great work, and you're a lot more entertaining to follow than my college physics teacher, even if he did study under Niels Bohr!
I appreciate the video, but haven't watched F1 in awhile. IMO it's less about racing and more about rules lawyering. These new changes probably won't change that.
They always say the same thing That's we'll get better competition , closer wheel-to-wheel and all that. They also say cars will be slower when in reality in a year or two they'll be faster. It has been like this for as long as I have memory (I started watching in 1994). F1 is an engineering competition, not a racing one, really.
Just not true! Cars slowed down after 04. They slowed down again in 09 and finally in 2014. Granted, Mercedes made it work in the hybrid era and by 2016 they had recovered those losses, but the cars were still slower than 04. It was only with the 2017 regs that we started seeing the fastest cars, and they slowed them down again with the current regs. Also we do get better racing when they make it a priority, like in the 09-13 era. These current card also provide better racing, it's just the RB is dominating, so you don't see it at the front. Problem is, they made a mistake with the 2017, forgot that allowing more aero brings us back to the early 00s era, and now that they've fixed it with ground effect, they're ruining it again by getting rid of it. On the surface, smaller cars with less weight make for more nimble cars, which is good, but getting rid of ground effect downforce and over relying on regen is just idiotic. I dont midn hybrids, i dont mind EVs, I dont mind synthetic fuelds or whatever, but having to lift and coast and brake early and managing energy levels is just not racing imo
@@slavtrooper3851 but they're slower than 2017, which I used as an example to counter the point that the cars always get faster? And tbh, I am not so sure they're faster than 04 either? Some records are still from that era, and the ones that aren't, are from the previous reg era
@@slavtrooper3851 by 2017, I meant those regs, not the year. And they're just not, all the records from comparable tracks are still from 2019 or 2020. Barcelona doesn't count due to removal of chicane, for example
People want to win and if u want to win under these certain "conditions"..u have to innovate or cheat to have the egde(other than having a better driver)..these races are the perfect environment for innovation in technology that can be replicate or reproduce in daily drive car..
1. Manufacturers want more road-relevant cars. 2. Fans and drivers want smaller and lighter cars. 3. Slower cars generally make for better racing. 4. The current ground effect rules make the cars difficult to race and set up. 5. I agree that they should've waited a couple years before making these changes now that the field is so close, but it is what it is.
F1 needs to dial back all the regs. The best way to level the playing field is to reduce regs and let teams engineer a car the way they need to. Back in the 90s an engine could be any NA configuration under a max capacity and a sequential trans wasn't required either. In the 70s cars could have 6 wheels and really experiment with new ideas. More regs makes closing the performance gap harder especially for teams that lack the financial budget that larger teams have.
Great analysis! One other consequence of choosing to slow earlier before corners is forcing drivers behind to also slow, even if they're on a "lower energy" strategy, where they're choosing to harvest less to arrive at the corner quicker... will make for some "interesting" driver strategies for preventing overtakes, etc. Not sure yet if this is a good or bad thing, I suppose it depends who is doing it and how much. Not sold on the new rules, to be honest. Really don't think they're much of a move forward, except I do like allowing active aero, although I suspect even that will be severely restricted in terms of "differential" aero to help cornering, etc...
I don’t understand why sustainability needs to be a part of F1. It’s about putting as much power to the ground as quickly as possible, not trying to save the world with renewable energy. Each team probably uses and emits twice as much fuel / CO2 driving themselves to the track than the cars use in the actual race. I understand it, but I don’t get it.
Its marketing gimmick, its not about sustainability, its just another word for green washing! They can make ICE sustainable, its not a technical issue its a political issue! F1 is the most political of all motorsports.
@@willemkanon4020no, thisnis some talking point invented a couple of decades ago because it just happened to work out that way, but it was never the intention.
Finally, a really clear and detailed explanation about the 2026 rules. Thanks ❤❤❤❤ By the way, how happy are you now that F1 has become competitive?(Because of your video last year about F1 vs. WEC)
It's going to be like the 1970s 500hp super slow F1 cars. Also the double DRS thing seems unsafe. It also seems like a gimmick approach rather than one solid philosophy
Well if you reduce energy, you have to improve efficiency. In a straight line, there's no need for the cars to have so much drag (while accelerating), as it's just wasted energy.
@@EngineeringExplainedcompletely agreed but how much will we sacrifice in the turns to go faster in the straights? And the new press to pass is worse than Drs imo. Some drivers have speculated 8-10 seconds slower which on some tracks is close to the f2-f1 difference. Fingers crossed either way
Thanks you so much for this video. You should do a follow up video, or series of videos, answering people’s questions about this topic. You could even do a full video for each of your points in this video. You should also do a more in-depth video discussing the actual strategies that might be employed to win a race or respond to events that might be encountered.
We need fewer rules and the V12 back! This would revive the sport! It could be a hybrid using sustainable fuel and all that BS they pretend to care about.
I just wish it could be posible to do something similar to the WEC, give the teams performance windows for power, weight, aero, etc, and let them go nuts with these parameters, but that would probably be expensive, and end with a team either dominating the championship, or out in the dust (looking at you, wingless 9X8)
You say fewer rules than you say (essentially) that you will make V12 mandatory (as no one would choose it of their own choice (without the BOP of WEC, but even then it's not a good choice)). 🙂 I think requiring an NA 3.2 V12 would be great (twice the current engine with no turbo), but you'd have to rule that they have to use it as such an engine is large, heavy and inefficient when given a free-choice (e.g., V4 twin-turbo is smaller, lighter and more efficient by comparison).
F1 doesn't know if they want to be the fastest cars or the best drivers, they should either allow teams to do wathever they want or make everyone use the same car, but then it would be either indy car or top fuel thats why they try to be both and achieve nothing. F1 is not the peak of racing anymore
@@axelode45 if the cars don't have rules then whoever wins is the one with the best team (the most money) if the cars have to many rules then however wins is the one with the best drivers (the most money)
Always a great listen. Thanks for getting to the point that these strange-seeming constraints might have been carefully crafted to make F1 more interesting by increasing the overtaking opportunities via different energy management strategies.
Is it just me ... or are the people running F1 even nerdier than Jason for coming up with this junk? (And me after watching & enjoying this video ...) Oh, and how do ANY of these regulations actually help accomplish either of the goals of racing: Enjoyable spectator sport Push engineering & innovation Why not simply limit the tire size, implement crash safety regulations, and then let the race teams go at it?
Maybe the 345 kph limit for the electric motor is because it has a redline that is too low to push any further, maybe the electric drive should have a multispeed gearbox?
Near the end of the video, I think Jason explains how there will be new strategies and skills for the teams and drivers to work on. Lap-to-lap, and corner-to-corner, it seems likely that there's potential for massive differences in available electric power between cars.
Because series like Group B, Group C and DTM tried that in the past and they've all had to shut down due to skyrocketing costs and the richest team dominating the sport.
I'm really worried. The hyper-focus on environmentalism keeps detracting from entertainment generation after generation. Nobody wants to see which car will be able to save more fuel or to recharge batteries more. The public wants to see them go FAST and SCREAMING
Watch drag races if that's what you're into. F1 engineered toward progress and the future. Manufacturers have no use for outdated technology that will never be legal again.
Great video, Jason 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻 It would be great if, during the races and qualifying sessions, we could have more on-screen information about the energy storage and flow of the cars. Such great engineering development we’re missing.
Absolutely brilliant explanation of the new rules! Been a F1 fan for over 50 years and YES, engineers will engineer. Cars will probably be slower for a year or two but they will figure it out and before you know it they will be bringing those lap times down!!
There's a couple things I'd mention: 1st, I'd say the speed limit has to be a safety consideration, which leads to a conversation about tires and the forces that these are able to withstand consistently; the cars have to be able to operate within the structural limits of the tires. But not just that, would you rather have a tire blow out in Baku at 450kms/hr or 350kms/hr? And what would a crash at 450kms/hr mean in terms of debris flying around the track and into the crowds potentially. And second, I think the decrease in downforce will force the cars to be a little more unpredictable in the turns which will really highlight the skill of the drivers and we'll see them manhandling the cars a lot more, much like what we see in Indy Car races, so, I think these changes have real potential to make the races way more exciting and dramatic.
This is why I quit watching F1 in the 90's I'm glad I got to enjoy it in the best years. I'm not saying the drivers aren't amazing. I'm saying the rules are crap. If you want to push all the battery stuff then make 2 classes. All ICE and all Electric. I bet you will see what people really care about.
They did. Its called Formula E and the only people really interested in it are the kind who would not look oyt of places among the Just Stop Oil protesters. 😂 And it is being used as a warehouse for drivers who can't quite make it in F1. 😂 Even the FIA knows its boring AF. That's why it is no longer trying to shove it down our throats as much these days. 😂
@stevemawer848 a big part of the fE strategy is maintaining enough energy to finish. That was cool when I started watching, but it's restrictive. I really don't like it.
@@EarendilStar I am a fan of racing. I'm not a fan of the FIA dictating the winner through rule changes. All they need to do is leave the rules alone and let the teams compete.
@@GoatTheGoat But that’s not what you said, you said you have “zero interest” in a race car with a particular power train. Since racing is about race craft and driving a vehicle on the edge of adhesion, I fail to see how the drivetrain matters…except for the sound.
@@AdminAbuse I don’t think you know what Gatekeeping is. They’re the ones saying they want to stay on the other side of the gate; “no interest in watching”.
Bruh! This was SO meaty! Excellent information. I was just wondering if you lose leads when you book them on the calendar at a time inconvenient to them. I suppose they would just update their invitation from their email, right? That's the only question from a nearly 2 hour buffet. You rock, man. Seriously.
The U.S. automotive industry has been fully metric for decades. In the '90's I was a Product Designer for a manufacturer of analytical instruments. Since the inception of the company in the early '80's the products had all been designed with U.S. traditional measurements and hardware. When given the primary responsibility for a new product line and also being aware that more than 50% of the company sale were to foreign countries I suggested that we switch to metric. The management was initially wary, worrying that it would increase cost. After the purchasing department looked into the matter it was determined that there was no cost impact and the switch was made. Attempting to do anything as simple as replacing an SAE threaded fastener in, e.g., Japan, is difficult. In the U.S. any hardware store has stocks of metric fasteners. These days any product made in China will be fully metric and American consumers can't get enough of them.
That's really good to know. It would be great if general public were to slowly change to metric. Is so frustrating that I can go almost everywhere in Europe, Asia and South America or elsewhere and measures are the same. Only when going to us is a mess with everything measure related. I only understand miles because I love to drive but the first time I heard Fahrenheit apart from school I thought they were f*ing billing! I can only dream... Btw in Canada use imperial or metric?
Actually, for most circuits on the calendar, most of the harvest energy will come from part load harvesting where the engine is running against the MGUK to charge the energy storage. On tracks like Baku this will mean that none of the energy comes from “lifting” on straights but will come from part load harvesting and braking…
Battery boost is used strategically, especially when coming out of a tight corner (sharp acceleration). It is usually not used in straights, unless there is an absolute need for it.
The math was good. I like. I'm long out of school now though so had to think about some of those Force Drag equations again. I like the approach to all of this! Felt like a great way to analyze energy and deployment and lap times over a race. Great vid
All of these changes seem to be targeting improved overtaking opportunities at corners. Basically under the new regs mid-corner speeds will compulsorily be slower (downforce, tyre width). The bigger the speed differential between the preceding straight and the apex, the greater the opportunity for overtaking, even more so if drivers are motivated to tinker with their braking intensity. What the greater electric contribution achieves is probably better considered as torque rather than power. There will be more rapid acceleration out of corners, which should improve the show and help to recover lap time that's been sacrificed to the lower cornering speeds. The cars being lighter and smaller will also help here. Even if average speed across a lap ends up a bit lower there's going to be more decelerating and (faster) accelerating, making the cars' movement seem more violent and probably more exciting to watch even when running alone.
The energy recovery will work not only in braking zones but in partial throttle operation. Getting rid of MGU-h they need to find good strategy to spool up the turbo. So the ICE will produce more power than the driver requests to both charge the battery and keep turbo spooled. You could just forgo this strategy and rely on electrical engine to compensate for the turbo lag. So on some tracks there will be more one or the other but it always will be combination of those two. I recon we will see a lot of fuel saving in races. It will be a more important factor than tires probably
While I don’t like moving even further with the hybrid split I DO think “slower” cars that are faster in a straight line is the way to go. The ultimate pace comes from the freakish cornering ability but the cars just cannot race each other with that much aero. I’m fine if we never get cars that match the track times of things like the W11 again (especially if we get V8’s with eco fuels and smaller chassis 😁)
The point of active aero is to apply it in the straights, where you do need less drag and less downforce. But in cornering, you apply the other mode, where you get the downforce back. So the cars would not be 7 seconds slower on average in the corners. Am I missing something?
You should also do a more in-depth video discussing the actual strategies that might be employed to win a race or respond to events that might be encountered.
I enjoy this type of video. I believe once the teams get accustomed to the new rules they will find new loopholes to make the cars faster than they are currently.
I love your explanation. But there's another factor that I'm missing. Regenerating electrical energy goes through the rear axles MGU-K. While most of the kinetic energy dissapates through the front wheels. And also in picking up 3x more energy from the rear shafts. It means it will become a headache to maintain the temperature in the rear brakes and tyres.
AFAICT, after reading the rules on the energy recovery system, there's nothing in the rules preventing the teams from using the ICE to generate e- power during the cornering phase. I.e. I think that it's possible for teams to recover kinetic energy from their momentum during braking, but also to generate additional power "to be recovered" from the ICE during cornering, when there is no energy recovery from braking, and when the ICE PU is not at full throttle.
Awesome video. Interested to see how close to the money you end up being. One thing I do notice with my car (ICE) that has a computer showing the kW, is whilst I can use 300+kW to accelerate quickly, on the motorway/freeway it'll tick along at less than a 100kW - often around 20-30. So _maybe_ we'll see very comparable times as the car rockets to top speed from the corner, then recharges the battery as the power needed to maintain vmax is less than what the ICE can pump out. Having said that - my vmax of 110kmh has significantly less drag than 300+kmh so maybe the ICE struggles to maintain that speed and has nothing spare to recharge.
This sounds like there will be more usable power over short durations and less weight vs lower top speed and less downforce. Will be interesting to see how this pans out. Of course the math will look really bad if we're looking at only the top speed and cornering speed with the same weight and energy recovery. It's more complicated than that. But it does give interesting insight into where the strategies might go in 2026. E.g. better strategies in deploying the power only during specific straights and at the beginning of those straights. etc.
Much as javelin designs had to change when 100m was reached (can't be impaling the audience, bad for ticket sales), rules in other sports need to deal with the real world, whether to address safety, or efficiency or even PR and spectacle. Life goes on, good teams work out how to use the rules and the best drivers deal with (or help develop) whatever they're sat in.
One of the interesting things about F1 is that the engineers eventually work out the limitations put on them with new rule changes. My expectation is that the cars will initially be slower but will eventually exceed current speeds. Whoever does a better job early on will have the advantage but then the lap times will converge.
I remember reading a few years ago that an engineer in F1 said they wish they can recover from the front wheels, too, just so that they have more energy recovery for more average power for the the entire race. I'm still a bit devastated that they got rid of the MGU-H but I understand that it is so complex that it bars the entry for more manufacturers. Also, it's not like the MGU-H does all that much to control boost since they still have to use wastegates on long straights.
One key thing is the active aero (drs 2.0) which you can enable at will. Cars will accellerate faster to the 345km limit for e-assited drive, and it will require less energy for the ice to maintain/accelerate beyond that. Hope thats the key to solve the energy delta. In my opinion they should increase delta and remove any caps for energy recovery. Personally I think they should have electric drive on the fronts. Electric 4wd for cornering/acceleration + the greatest energy recovery.
Looks like ERS management will be a big factor in races in 2026, which IMO will create some really interesting racing strategy alongside the DRS changes.
The lower downforce also means there's less penalty in following another car through a corner. I would anticipate this will increase the amount of passing in a race. I would also speculate that the rule change was designed around that end (among other aims).
As much as I like closer racing, having limits such as BOP and power limits just feels really fake. What's the point of making the best car that you can when there's that anyway?
A lot of math in this video, that's my bad.
At this point math is more fun than watching F1…..
The math is more exciting than the F1 these days. Should be unlimited boost, unlimited RPM. Get rid of the electric crap.
What's wrong with math?
No, math is good! It's the language we use for describing, defining and predicting physics. It's important and interesting and helpful even (especially?) when it's almost like you planned it out.
Don't listen to the haters. This is great.
"So let's try to solve it with some Expo markers and a whiteboard."
Yes! That's why I'm here.
Exactly! The degree of precision of this "much better than guesswork" method is impressive.🙂
That's why i watch this channel😂
And math. Don't forget the MATH!
I now have a headache. You people have issues. 😂✌️😵💫🇺🇸. NASCAR is a more relaxed sport. 🍺🍕🇺🇸
Everytime F1 significantly changes the rules it makes F1 less competitive. The smaller teams don't have the money and resources to redevelop as quickly as Bull, Merc, and Ferrari. So we are looking at another crap season in F1 where one or 2 teams win everything and the other teams just crash out of every race. The whole sport needs to either change completely or just go away.
Can't wait to come back in 2026 for Jason to reference this video when f1 is 7s slower
Don't tempt me! 😂
I have no doubt Super Formula will be faster. The performence cut is worse than 2014 and back then SF would qualify mid grid
@@Willbrse"no doubt" lol
@@Willbrse i wish there was a bookmark feature on youtube for comments like these lmaoo "no doubt"
If the racing is good, does it really matter? Do people complain that the F1 cars were 5 seconds slower 20 years ago?
Something in me dislikes whenever rules are put down, that limit efficiency... like the aero efficiency limit in LM, removal of MGU-H, and even a cap on recovered energy per lap
they dont get near the energy recovery per lap figure at the moment anyway.
The MGU-H is a highly complicated and thus, very expensive piece of kit. Audi / Porsche / VW did not want to get involved in F1 if the MGU-H remained. All the f1 teams (I believe) are quite happy to be losing this complicated costly part
Every race league has rules. The ones that don’t last a few years and then get banned/canceled.
I agree it's mostly for cost but also partly to "improve the sound" of the cars. In the current regs, a lot of the "racecar sound" is attenuated by the energy recovery because those sound pulses are essentially wasted energy. Plus without the MGU-H, we'll get awesome blowoff sounds!
@@phonebem its 30% less energy in the exhaust. it will make the cars even quieter and lower reving
"So expect Ferrari to absolutely nail the strategy."
Perfection. 👌
idk why that rule about limiting the cars' energy recovery rate is even there? if there's all that power in braking being left on the table, especially as the ICE becomes less powerful and the PU relies more on the electric motor, why the hell can't they take full advantage of that energy regen?
the recovery limmit is irelevent. they cant do the 4mj currently permited.
ICE motor will be used to recover said energy
@@1CoLoRz2that’s being banned for 2026. Only under braking can you recover energy.
yes I agree that is bollocks - too many rules and regulations
Yes the teams all agree the ICE will be used as a generator for a fair portion of the laps a (at the end of the straights) that is the only way they can make use of the 8.5Mj of energy store per lap.
15:55 this is exactly the problem Verstappen & Horner raised and were told by the FIA they were exaggerating
I don't know how it was in the past with rulemaking but now it is a game of keeping the
big players happy. MGU-K? Higher efficiency but No, to complicated. 4WD? No, Audi will have an advantage due to LMP1. 11th team? No, they will take our market share. You just have to hate politics in sport. So many compromises.
I think it's the MGU-H they are getting rid of. Which is weird since VW just came out with one for the new 911.
But yeah agreed, It's getting to the point where a Porsche road car will have more tech on it than an F1 car, their new Active suspension is pretty awesome too.
Having active aero but no active suspension is also a big miss.
So silly to not have had energy recovery and deployment on the front axle.
@@tHebUm18the other big teams are worried that Audi will come in and dominate the field with the experience they had with their lmp1 cars. Which absolutely destroyed the WEC for better than half a decade. Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren cannot be embarrassed by a new team. Instead of trying to keep up with the technology, they’d rather the technology no exist to compete with
the sport is becoming over-regulated. the rulebook just keeps growing as it slowly turns into a spec series
They are also going to have narrower tires in the new regs, which is where some of the reduced drag comes from, but it will also make corner’s slower due to loss in mechanical grip
yeah I don't think we need math to understand less rubber reduces grip far more then the aerodynamic benefit... but I'd be curious if that could be calculated.
@@flip_moto I wouldn't be so sure. Williams claimed the narrower tyres in 1993 made their car faster overall. That was a much more significant reduction in tyre width than for 2026 too.
@@flip_moto the width of the tyre is a highly unusual concept as its heat management rather than contact patch. coeficent of friction is identical so for an identical compound narrower tyres would be faster due to less weight and less drag. however the tyres have the say 100kw of energy across 40cm v 30cm. energy will be heat. so the skinny tyres will blister, that causes a harder compound to be needed. and the harder compound is what looses time.
the same concept can be used on snow. there are 2 options. so much surface area that you grip anyway, or studded tyres that focus really high pressure meaning you have grip.
@@somethingfunny6867 Your thinking of classroom physics. In the real world the drag coefficient goes up with wider tyres since the road isnt perfectly flat and the tyre isnt either. They have bumps/ridges that can interlock with each other. Wider tyres means there are more bumps/ridges the tyres can latch on to.
@@Polla9203 no thats not how it works at all. the softer compounds used can go deeper into the micro bumps and ridges. and that is what gives more grip.
Juan Pablo Montoya said in an interview. "If we had the tires of the current F1 cars, we would rip out our heads off". It was just pure power limited by mechanical grip
Yeah i remember the early 2000s v10s with screaming engines and the tight small body with no halo. Thos WERE the days
I've watched the WEC at the peak of LMP1, where the max. amount of energy allowed per lap was really restrictive. It's not going to be that much of "they look sooooo much slower", but rather "we can see how much faster they *could* go".
In comparison, the Porsche 919 LMP1h, could recover 8MJ per lap, and had similar ICE and electrical power to the upcoming 2026 cars. Even tho the Porsche had the same "average" energy as the 2MJ recovery and 4MJ cars (those cars were allowed more fuel per lap, given they had less recovered energy), Porsche were able to choose where to deploying it. And mathematically it was much faster to explode all of that energy at the beginning of every straight so that the car would go from 120kph to 260kph in like 3 seconds, and then the car will rely on the ICE only. The electric boost was also handy at creating huge speed differences on the straights depending on deployment to help overtake. However, later, the electric deployment was pulled back a bit to 400hp, and the cars would race more evenly.
Hope we don’t get massive speed differences that lead to most overtakes but rather fighting in braking and corners
I guess during the ICE only phase gear choice is important?
@@thurbine2411in theory even if you use your deployment to pass, they can use to defend… or wait till later in the lap to get you back. Track position becomes less important but overall pace and tire grip is more important.
LMP1H from 2012 to 2016 is peak motorsport. I wish F1 would use those regs for engine minus diesel
I think F1 should limit the hybrid power to 240~260 max so they have energy after every corner. After that only the override function works. And also keep downforce levels similar to what they have now so the movable front wing wont be necessary and the cars won't be much slower. And maybe they could carry less batteries that way.
But the whole idea abt going till 345kph with the hybrid seems like a wet dream. There isn't enough energy for that.
@@Willbrse I wouldn’t say that slower cars than today especially at start of very new regs would be that bad. I agree that it would be better to not have to have active aero. Think one of the most important things would be to have the cars smaller so you can take more different lines as well as giving more room for different setups and developments of the cars
The most exciting eras of F1, CanAm, Group B etc has been when teams have found new innovations or loop holes in the rule book. The sport is inching further and further away from that and for teams to have an ability to create unique and innovative cars.
I wish they opened up the rules for innovation and creativity and set a handful of very limiting parameters that the teams had to work with. Like a very constricted fuel supply but any engine configuration they decide on. Active aero but a very limited body work area, a 3D-scanner could easily check the area number. Not regulate tire sizes and let more tire suppliers in to the sport.
And Id love to hear what people actually working in F1 thinks. Or someone who used to work there and has nothing to loose by speaking freely.
Yeah I don't get this.
At first I was like cool. They have more energy for their batteries. Motors are amazing, and they should. The teams will find the best ways to get more from the motors now.
Then they start putting limits on everything about the system while using less powerful fuel...
The sport seems to be losing its identity. It needs less rules. More unique designs. Cap the money somehow if that means only richer teams will win.
Or at least a bit more room for different designs. Engines would probably be the same for most cars even if the choice was free but it just feels like the current regs don’t allow for much difference in setup or aero. All cars have to run super low to be fast and rules are very strict in how things should look
@@dianapennepacker6854 I agree that the poorer teams should get a shot at scoring points. But looking at the history of the sport, when theyve been trying to restrict spending in certain areas. The teams with bigger funds can throw more money on other areas of development rendering those caps counterproductive.
Brawn won a championship cause they found an innovative loophole and they pursued it cause they were desperately underfunded and hungry to survive.
Looser regulations leaves more room for idea based innovation and great ideas are usually cheaper than incremental R&D. And if you ask me. Innovation was what F1 used to be about and what Id like to see more of.
@@dianapennepacker6854cap the money somehow lol you've been following closely haven't you
@@bodanerius you'd then need BOP to ensure close racing. never forget that open regs always create large gaps between cars / teams. if you want closer racing, regulating strict limits on everything is one way to do it along with a budget cap. At the moment F1 has the tightest bunched field in its history. how that isn't exciting for anyone is beyond me. tbh i'm not looking forward to the '26 changes purely because one team probably gonna dominate
This is a really great video. There’s quite a bit going on here, but you just communicate it all so well.
It can’t be easy deciding the level of detail to go into for a video like this, but you do a very good job and seem to always get the balance just perfect (in my opinion)!
They need to make the cars smaller. Every major regulation change has made them bigger, and has made overtaking harder
A couple of thoughts on this Jason.
The current rules allow for a maximum recovery of 2MJ per lap from the MGUK to the battery and 4MJ per lap deployment from the battery to the MGUK.
But the energy transferred between the MGUH and the battery and between the MGUH and MGUK is unlimited.
At most tracks the cars cannot recover the full 2MJ per lap under braking alone. They have to burn fuel at part throttle to boost the recovery.
For 2026 the energy recovered per lap is 8.5MJ but the deployment is unlimited.
Meaning that the recovered energy by the MGUK to the battery is over 4 times the amount in the current rules.
The 2026 rules have specific rules about recovering energy when the driver is on throttle.
At part throttle there is a rule that limits fuel flow (article 5.4.5) to, presumably, limit energy recovery.
This means that the ICE will be making more power in some corners than would normally be the case.
For example, the hairpin at Monaco, where the engines barely make power, the 2026 ICE could make as much as 120kW, which would be used for energy recovery.
In article 5.14.8 the rate at which the PU output when at maximum power demand (ie full throttle) is reduced is defined. It also specifies that the maximu reduction is 450kW and that the MGUK must stay above -100kW (ie no more than 100kW of recovery).
It is likely, IMO, that the cars will reach the end of a long straight with only 300kW, not 400kW, if only for a second or two.
Most tracks have 10-15s of heavy braking, which would give the 2026 car roughly 1/2 the allowable energy recovery. The rest will have to be from fuel burning, so the minimum fuel is probably going to be ~90kg, maybe more.
Using the power numbers in your video, and by the rule 5.4.8, the 2026 cars will have more power than the 2024 cars up to 304kph.
Basically, IMO, the 2026 PUs are too heavy for their power (they are much the same weight as the current PU), and the style of ERS is more suitable for stop-start commuter traffic than high speed race cars.
I wonder what the lap times would be without the ERS and the maybe extra 100kg of weight it causes.
No that's not right, the MGU-H does not recover energy at part throttle. It does it at wide open throttle.
They get just under 200 bhp from the MGU-H, and there's no way you'd get that from part throttle.
MGU-H is gone in ‘26
the maximum start fuel will be 70kg by rules. fuel flow rate i dont know. but the start fuel load is down 30%
its quite a clever strategy. finally got me to understand what max was saying a year or so ago about cars breaking on the straights.
MGU-H isn't burning fuel at part throttle, so you are fundamentally wrong.
@@jaredscott4829 You misunderstand.
In current F1 they recover energy by burning fuel in the ICE to run the MGUK as a generator when at part throttle.
That will also need to be the case in 2026.
One thing I noticed is that whenever they talk about speed they mean in qualifying trim. I always thought that the total time over race distance (305km) or fastest lap of the race is a better indicator of an F1 car's "speed". That's why the 2004 cars held records for so long and still do. That's without DRS or slick tyres.
Fuel load is another huge one since refueling has been disallowed
You do know that thouse cars could push with an empty fule, needing to drive qualy times. While modern cars just cruse around to save the tires and only rarely push in the race when they under pressure, and even than they have a full fule. Only in qatar they where pushing qualy times every lap because they needed to pit anyways because of the fia and there the drivers nearly passed out.
without DRS and slick tyres yes but with more than 200kg less weight and no where near as much fuel onboard. you're comparing apples to oranges
@@SHRModding apples to oranges is the whole topic of this video
@@BHRxRACER is it? Anyhow my point was that the weight advantage alone gives the 2004 cars way more laptime than DRS and slicks could ever overcome
What you describe in the last part is what everyone is concerned. They are going to lift early to regen, lap times are going to be slower.
laptimes slower but more overtaking opportunities
@@pierrepressure8575 todays regulations in theory had the same goal.
@@SE3552And it worked
@@SE3552 second time's the charm!
Cool. You lift and coast and you get overtaken.
The question is were the lap times slower or faster than 2020 or 2004 or 1994 at Silverstone last weekend? Does anyone know or care?
I’m even more pessimistic. He hasn’t included a critical issue. With 30% less downforce, corner exit speed will be a lot slower, making his straitaway analysis overly optimistic.
Corner entry speed will also be a lot slower, so it's not that optimistic
I mean the medium-slow corner exit speed wont be that big of a concern, theyll be a bit lighter, with a tiny bit skinnier tyres but the torque of the electric engine will really help launch it out. In slow corners downforce isnt much
And also we dont know how that 30% adds up maybe they calculated it 50/50% from z and x mode, could be that in normal mode it will only lose 10-15percent
11:33...
nope as he also asumed 350kph in a perfect circel which is such a massive mistake that I can't believe that noone pointed that out yet
F1 became a bunch of gimmicks strapped together instead of the ultimate expression of a racecar
But when the cars is to fast: Races are boring!😂
I’d recommend you look back at the 6 wheeled cars, ones with double wings, the tusks, etc. F1 rules changing force teams to innovate which is the primary part of the sport. All the money is in constructors, drivers is the glory.
F1 has always been about hundreds of the world’s best engineers pushing the limits on R&D.
Stick with endurance racing and hypercars
Agreed, I've been watching since 89. The paddle shifter was the first gimmick that helped start to throw the sport off course but it really lost its way when all the electronics, computers, passing and driver aids came into play. These days race cars resemble less of an actual car and more of a rolling computer with an engine.
The thing is if they allow unlimited development for the ultimate expression of a racecar, we'd end up with weird stuff like the Red bull prototypes in Gran Turismo. Those racing is a sight to behold, not in a good way.
In the end, Christian H...y was not wrong saying that the drivers would lift off in the end of the straight lines to recover energy.
They're already doing that and have been for years now though
that top speed isn't hit at very many tracks, monza, mexico, baku is where they can hit 360 - 370. most of the time they are at 340 or less at their fastest point.
Yep, but if the cars had way less drag they'd be able to reach higher speeds quicker!
They will still have higher speeds on the straights or more downforce while still having same top speed
When did anyone go over 350 at Baku?
@@andrewlutes2048 Good question, got me looking. Mostly about 340 kmh expected through traps in Baku. But for science in 2016 Bottas reached 378 kph on straight and 366.1 through the the traps
Aren’t the cars geared differently for different tracks?
Great job Jason. Your closing is perfect "engineers will engineer"
I liked his Ferrari strategy comment too! 😂
Beyond safety requirements, fuel tank size, and other obvious basics, F1 should really be a free for all as far as engineering goes.
Might as well throw safety out the window completely at that point. There's no surviving crashing 800km/h rockets anyway
But dying isnt very safe, at least in my opinion @oyuyuy
They did that for a while, but at that time, it was the most dangerous sport in the world. Either watch the old races or build your own death cart lmao
@@Neridian_ Just don't die?
It was the same with Group B back in the day
This might be my favorite video from this channel. Thanks
Sometimes I wonder if FIA just pulls these numbers out of thin air
Oh no, their engineers do heavy ammounts of guessearch. The only numbers they really care about are financial related.
Why would they make f1 teams go slow intentionally to charge a battery? I think hybrids are great but that just sucks. The whole point of f1 is that these are the fastest cars in the world.
If they want small fast light and efficient, why not: turbo v8 with a little electric power from breaking and exhaust used to give boost to the engine? And then use renewable fuel.
Completely out of their asses!
100%
@@gustavofigueiredo1798 Yeah, I have a feeling that is why we have fewer and fewer real, actual, racetracks on the calander.
I hate how contrived the rules are. If they want to slow cars down, just limit the engine/battery size. Beyond that teams should be left to exploit the hardware to the maximum possible.
On aero you don't include less grip from the tyres. 15:48 unintended side effect. Bad rules lead to side effects
One remark: In order to regenerate 8.5 MJ the electric motor needs tobrake for around 20 seconds. Problem is that F1 doesn't brake for 20s during a lap and therefore will have less than 8.5MJ available. One option is to let the engine produce more power when it is not required, halfway a corner for instance, and regenerate at that point. This will require more fuel then.
There is a method which would sound really strange... revving the engines mid corner to charge the baterry its possible
@@zoli8569 That's not efficient
@@TheFPSPower It's what will happen though. You are allowed up to 30% torque from the engine to charge the battery while the driver has zero throttle on. The 70kg fuel limit is very unlikely to happen, most likely it will be 100kg again and used to generate electricity.
The current cars can't regenerate their allowed 4 MJ per lap either. They can use that 4 MJ from the battery when they need to, and then need to recover it, usually over multiple laps. So they don't have 4MJ of electric power available each lap either.
My guess is that on most tracks, these cars might be able to barely recover 4.5 MJ, and use the rest 4 MJ from the battery, for 8.5 MJ total usage on a push lap. because I don't see why there would be a 8.5 MJ per lap battery usage limit if they could never reach that anyway because the storage delta is only 4 MJ and they can't recover enough for the rest of the per-lap limit.
If all that is true, then they can almost recover the battery to full in a single recovery lap after doing that push lap, which IMO could be a good thing. Or keep using the battery power in a balanced manner where they recover as much as they use.
you have found the reason why the new rules are being binned by 2030. i suspect they wont ever get implemented.
Formula 1 as gone back to Bernie Ecclestone mindset and politics. The current F1 cars that are the best at following each other through corners for more than 15 years was the vision from Chase Carey , Sean Bratches and Ross Brawn. F1 needed Ross Brawn because he was afraid of the team principals nor was he was trying to curry favor to secure his career. The trio was the best leadership team for Formula 1. You wouldnt have Netflix, freedom of social media, cameras going inside the garages, tech time to talk about the sticky uppy bits, we wouldnt have none of that. Sadly F1 greatest weakness is politics where persons are put in power based on the benefits of outside stakeholders and not on their ability to lead sport to become greater.
F1's greatest weakness is the freaking FIA
These wide giant cars are not the best for racing. Yes, they can follow better than the 2017-21 cars, but they didn't change enough. They needed to be closer to the size of the 2012-16 cars. They needed a higher rear wing which would have provided more visibility for the drivers while reducing the turbulence at the rear, and a slightly smaller front wing not the huge plow they put on. The 18inch tires require more energy to spin up and slow down. Ross Brawn and Pat Fry gave us an extension of the 2017 rules. They are better, but not good enough for wheel to wheel racing. Hopefully the smaller cars even with their power limitations will provide better wheel to wheel racing.
I like em sticky uppy, pointy outy bits
@@uncleelias Ross Brawn said it himself that these car were a step in the right direction not the perfect solution. He said before he left they were improvements to be made. The 2026 regs should have been a evolution but not another revolution such as 2014 and 2017
Such is life. Politics ruins everything
"It's almost like I planned this out."
Isn't math great?
I'm a little bit dissapointed by the new rules. I hoped they would unleash the engineers at energy recovery and reuse. Like give them 240-360kW MGU-K, keep the MGU-H, and let them recover and deploy as they like. But this would probably favor the best engineering team too much.
The shorter wheelbase will even further decrease the cornering speed, as with a shorter leaver you reach the maximum force the contact patch can support sooner. Tire strategy will also be interesting. As we take load of in terms of weight and downforce i expect only one stop at any dry race.
Wouldn't be great if the FIA just gave dimension, weight and tire restrictions and allowed teams to develop energy production in any means possible? Its near spec racing at this point.
@@flip_moto It depends on who you ask. When they started the hybrids it was slightly loose in terms of the MGU-H and HV battery as it was uncertain at the time how much the battery would suffer from the environment in the car. That alone gave Mercedes a huge advantage in the early years of their dominance.
Awesome for engineers, racing fans hated it, and the sponsors of other teams didn't like it either.
The current regulations make LMP1 engines viable and favor Audi, Ford, Porsche, and Toyota to enter F1. Audi is confirmed, Porsche couldn't agree with Red Bull so Ford will enter, and Toyota asked for sure but we don't know as they keep their business clean as usual.
the rules are not the limmit. they cant recover 4mj at the moment so have no chance of recovering 8. if they want a hope they need front wheel motors.
@@somethingfunny6867 you don't necessarily need to get to the front. They break at slightly under 2000kW only 120kW of it can be recovered. Without whiteboarding, I guess the rear axle can handle up to 500kW under braking. So they could 4x their recovery if they want to. With the front, they need a system that can handle about 4 MJ per hard braking point.
@@MrHaggyy whilst you are correct at 200mph by the time you are at 150mph the initial energy flow halfs, and grip halfs. by 7150mph you are limited by car energy and grip. 200mph down to 70 is about 0.5Mj around a lap you might get 4 of these. and recover no more than 2Mj/lap. with the new rules you might get another half a Mj/lap
This video definitely represented what I like best about your channel. It even included an awesome whiteboard presentation! Looking forward to the next one!
8:45 but currently the energy that goes directly from MGU-H to MGU-K (compound mode) is unlimited, it is only energy that goes through the battery that is limited per lap
From the moment they started talking about removing the MGU-H I kept trying to tell people that physics won't allow the cars to be faster. If you make the cars less massive, they recover less energy. If you make the regenerative motors (MGU-K) bigger, you spend more energy accelerating. This upcoming new PU was proposed as a unicorn. Additionally, this new fuel is also a unicorn in terms of efficiency in manufacturing it. This is what happens when the oil barons are running the FIA. The new PUs will also not save money as I expect them to be less reliable.
I don't think oil barons would be too happy about switching to synthetic fuels
@@jonathansmith7306 Where do you think synthetic fuels come from? Just because they are in theory "renewable", doesn't mean that oil isn't used in the production process. Think about all the equipment involved, trucks, tractors, plastics, everything runs on oil, no one is worried that oil is somehow going to become irrelevant. That's also why oil companies are one of the largest investors in renewables, they know that producing all the wind turbines (out of plastic), installing them (using fuel) and then having to cover the downtime (gas turbines) doesn't reduce oil consumption or price AT ALL. It might eventually reduce it in decades, but at that point they will have invested everything into renewables, it's pure politics.
A little less reliability might be exciting to watch. These cars don't break down at the rate they used to.
you forgot to factor in the active aero in your equation
Oil Barron's? Where's your source for this accusation?
lift and coast is also a common thing in f1 since a lot of years. its nothing new that driver go of the throttle early before a corner to use less energy and recuperate more
Yep, but not lift and brake haha.
Just because it's been common for a number of years because of poor regulations doesn't mean it's not a bad thing. It's going to get even worse in 2026 and be even more of a blight on the sport.
lift and coast is primarily to help cool the car at hot tracks. not to help the battery recover energy.
Doesn’t tire wear also play in?
@@WTFZOMG also fuel saving
3:13 Actually they always start the race with full battery. They charge it before the race doing a few laps on the track.
Ha, okay, but 4MJ out of 4,000MJ is pretty negligible. :)
@@EngineeringExplainedGiven that it seems unlikely that the battery can ever be fully charged up by regen, if the battery charge had been part of parc ferme, it could have opened up a new strategy of not pushing as hard in quali to have more charge at the start during a race.
As you stated, Ferrari could be expected to nail this type of strategy.
FANtastic. That was such fun, following your logic there. I wasn't following too close, of course, but --like MM8436 said--I'll be looking for the followup in 2026. Great work, and you're a lot more entertaining to follow than my college physics teacher, even if he did study under Niels Bohr!
Thx for covering F1. Such a seriously complex form of racing. I've watched nearly every race since 1988 when I finally got cable TV.
I appreciate the video, but haven't watched F1 in awhile. IMO it's less about racing and more about rules lawyering. These new changes probably won't change that.
They always say the same thing
That's we'll get better competition , closer wheel-to-wheel and all that. They also say cars will be slower when in reality in a year or two they'll be faster.
It has been like this for as long as I have memory (I started watching in 1994). F1 is an engineering competition, not a racing one, really.
Just not true!
Cars slowed down after 04. They slowed down again in 09 and finally in 2014. Granted, Mercedes made it work in the hybrid era and by 2016 they had recovered those losses, but the cars were still slower than 04. It was only with the 2017 regs that we started seeing the fastest cars, and they slowed them down again with the current regs.
Also we do get better racing when they make it a priority, like in the 09-13 era. These current card also provide better racing, it's just the RB is dominating, so you don't see it at the front.
Problem is, they made a mistake with the 2017, forgot that allowing more aero brings us back to the early 00s era, and now that they've fixed it with ground effect, they're ruining it again by getting rid of it.
On the surface, smaller cars with less weight make for more nimble cars, which is good, but getting rid of ground effect downforce and over relying on regen is just idiotic. I dont midn hybrids, i dont mind EVs, I dont mind synthetic fuelds or whatever, but having to lift and coast and brake early and managing energy levels is just not racing imo
@@tiansivive current cars are faster than 2004 regs buddy
@@slavtrooper3851 but they're slower than 2017, which I used as an example to counter the point that the cars always get faster?
And tbh, I am not so sure they're faster than 04 either? Some records are still from that era, and the ones that aren't, are from the previous reg era
@@tiansivive no they are faster than 2017 too. They are as fast as 2019 basically which is peak gen
@@slavtrooper3851 by 2017, I meant those regs, not the year. And they're just not, all the records from comparable tracks are still from 2019 or 2020. Barcelona doesn't count due to removal of chicane, for example
The real question is WHY are these changes being implemented
People want to win and if u want to win under these certain "conditions"..u have to innovate or cheat to have the egde(other than having a better driver)..these races are the perfect environment for innovation in technology that can be replicate or reproduce in daily drive car..
FIA executives have to justify their salaries
to make it "road relevant" for all the keyboard warriors demanding it on social media and to attract makers like audi
Money
1. Manufacturers want more road-relevant cars.
2. Fans and drivers want smaller and lighter cars.
3. Slower cars generally make for better racing.
4. The current ground effect rules make the cars difficult to race and set up.
5. I agree that they should've waited a couple years before making these changes now that the field is so close, but it is what it is.
F1 needs to dial back all the regs. The best way to level the playing field is to reduce regs and let teams engineer a car the way they need to. Back in the 90s an engine could be any NA configuration under a max capacity and a sequential trans wasn't required either. In the 70s cars could have 6 wheels and really experiment with new ideas. More regs makes closing the performance gap harder especially for teams that lack the financial budget that larger teams have.
Great analysis! One other consequence of choosing to slow earlier before corners is forcing drivers behind to also slow, even if they're on a "lower energy" strategy, where they're choosing to harvest less to arrive at the corner quicker... will make for some "interesting" driver strategies for preventing overtakes, etc. Not sure yet if this is a good or bad thing, I suppose it depends who is doing it and how much. Not sold on the new rules, to be honest. Really don't think they're much of a move forward, except I do like allowing active aero, although I suspect even that will be severely restricted in terms of "differential" aero to help cornering, etc...
I don’t understand why sustainability needs to be a part of F1. It’s about putting as much power to the ground as quickly as possible, not trying to save the world with renewable energy. Each team probably uses and emits twice as much fuel / CO2 driving themselves to the track than the cars use in the actual race. I understand it, but I don’t get it.
It's bullsh*t. Pure greenwashing. Imagine in the future if athletes were mandated to be vegan...
Isn't it more about innovating the industry? Putting as much more power down is what Americans do on drag strips.
Its marketing gimmick, its not about sustainability, its just another word for green washing!
They can make ICE sustainable, its not a technical issue its a political issue! F1 is the most political of all motorsports.
@@willemkanon4020no, thisnis some talking point invented a couple of decades ago because it just happened to work out that way, but it was never the intention.
Apparently my reply got deleted by yout*be. Let me comment again: It's bullsh*t. Pure greenwashing.
Finally, a really clear and detailed explanation about the 2026 rules. Thanks ❤❤❤❤
By the way, how happy are you now that F1 has become competitive?(Because of your video last year about F1 vs. WEC)
The past several races have been soo fun! Love to see it.
It's going to be like the 1970s 500hp super slow F1 cars. Also the double DRS thing seems unsafe. It also seems like a gimmick approach rather than one solid philosophy
Well if you reduce energy, you have to improve efficiency. In a straight line, there's no need for the cars to have so much drag (while accelerating), as it's just wasted energy.
@@EngineeringExplainedcompletely agreed but how much will we sacrifice in the turns to go faster in the straights? And the new press to pass is worse than Drs imo. Some drivers have speculated 8-10 seconds slower which on some tracks is close to the f2-f1 difference. Fingers crossed either way
@@EngineeringExplainedalso I'm a huge fan thanks for all the videos man
Thanks you so much for this video. You should do a follow up video, or series of videos, answering people’s questions about this topic. You could even do a full video for each of your points in this video.
You should also do a more in-depth video discussing the actual strategies that might be employed to win a race or respond to events that might be encountered.
From Montreal Canada! Jason, you must have been a great student! Great channel. Keep it up!
We need fewer rules and the V12 back! This would revive the sport!
It could be a hybrid using sustainable fuel and all that BS they pretend to care about.
I just wish it could be posible to do something similar to the WEC, give the teams performance windows for power, weight, aero, etc, and let them go nuts with these parameters, but that would probably be expensive, and end with a team either dominating the championship, or out in the dust (looking at you, wingless 9X8)
We actually need Autounion V16’s back
V10s please, like the new RB17 track car with a Cosworth 15,000RPM 1000 HP 4.5 liter V10
@@bernardomotard YES! V10 were also amazing!
You say fewer rules than you say (essentially) that you will make V12 mandatory (as no one would choose it of their own choice (without the BOP of WEC, but even then it's not a good choice)). 🙂 I think requiring an NA 3.2 V12 would be great (twice the current engine with no turbo), but you'd have to rule that they have to use it as such an engine is large, heavy and inefficient when given a free-choice (e.g., V4 twin-turbo is smaller, lighter and more efficient by comparison).
They are killing F1 slowly
F1 doesn't know if they want to be the fastest cars or the best drivers, they should either allow teams to do wathever they want or make everyone use the same car, but then it would be either indy car or top fuel thats why they try to be both and achieve nothing. F1 is not the peak of racing anymore
Why? None of those two are good options. A compromise between the two is, and always has been, the way to go.
Agreed.
@@axelode45 if the cars don't have rules then whoever wins is the one with the best team (the most money) if the cars have to many rules then however wins is the one with the best drivers (the most money)
@@Rianmt795I mean that's a very simple way of looking at it but yeah, why would you want any of those extremes?
Always a great listen. Thanks for getting to the point that these strange-seeming constraints might have been carefully crafted to make F1 more interesting by increasing the overtaking opportunities via different energy management strategies.
Bro u are literally the ninja nerd of engineering 🔥
Formula 1 , mehh. Did you see Red Bull RB17, engine is 4.5 liter v10. That is what i am excited.
Is it just me ... or are the people running F1 even nerdier than Jason for coming up with this junk? (And me after watching & enjoying this video ...)
Oh, and how do ANY of these regulations actually help accomplish either of the goals of racing:
Enjoyable spectator sport
Push engineering & innovation
Why not simply limit the tire size, implement crash safety regulations, and then let the race teams go at it?
Maybe the 345 kph limit for the electric motor is because it has a redline that is too low to push any further, maybe the electric drive should have a multispeed gearbox?
Near the end of the video, I think Jason explains how there will be new strategies and skills for the teams and drivers to work on. Lap-to-lap, and corner-to-corner, it seems likely that there's potential for massive differences in available electric power between cars.
Because series like Group B, Group C and DTM tried that in the past and they've all had to shut down due to skyrocketing costs and the richest team dominating the sport.
@@axelode45 good point - so then they'd also need to implement prototyping/development, salary, & per-race budgets and audit the teams' spending.
I'm really worried. The hyper-focus on environmentalism keeps detracting from entertainment generation after generation. Nobody wants to see which car will be able to save more fuel or to recharge batteries more. The public wants to see them go FAST and SCREAMING
Watch drag races if that's what you're into. F1 engineered toward progress and the future. Manufacturers have no use for outdated technology that will never be legal again.
@@qg6565 that's a ridiculous response, I want to see fast corners. And F1 needs a public, among other things
@reezlaw His response seemed reasonable to me. It seems like you just want something fundamentally different than what the purpose of f1 is.
@@qg6565 Go away hippie.
Awesome and very illustrative video. I was wondering about those factors too and you cleared them all out brilliantly
Great video, Jason 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻 It would be great if, during the races and qualifying sessions, we could have more on-screen information about the energy storage and flow of the cars. Such great engineering development we’re missing.
5:22 actually more like 33% more but sure, round up to 50%?
Sources? I can't find em
4225 is 47% more than 2870. So his rounding was about 470% more accurate than yours lol
I wish you were in charge of F1 rules. I get the objective of being fast and efficient; I think they are achieving neither
TLDR: In 2026 the team that makes the most efficient power unit will dominate again.
Absolutely brilliant explanation of the new rules! Been a F1 fan for over 50 years and YES, engineers will engineer. Cars will probably be slower for a year or two but they will figure it out and before you know it they will be bringing those lap times down!!
There's a couple things I'd mention:
1st, I'd say the speed limit has to be a safety consideration, which leads to a conversation about tires and the forces that these are able to withstand consistently; the cars have to be able to operate within the structural limits of the tires. But not just that, would you rather have a tire blow out in Baku at 450kms/hr or 350kms/hr? And what would a crash at 450kms/hr mean in terms of debris flying around the track and into the crowds potentially.
And second, I think the decrease in downforce will force the cars to be a little more unpredictable in the turns which will really highlight the skill of the drivers and we'll see them manhandling the cars a lot more, much like what we see in Indy Car races, so, I think these changes have real potential to make the races way more exciting and dramatic.
This is why I quit watching F1 in the 90's I'm glad I got to enjoy it in the best years. I'm not saying the drivers aren't amazing. I'm saying the rules are crap. If you want to push all the battery stuff then make 2 classes. All ICE and all Electric. I bet you will see what people really care about.
They did. Its called Formula E and the only people really interested in it are the kind who would not look oyt of places among the Just Stop Oil protesters. 😂 And it is being used as a warehouse for drivers who can't quite make it in F1. 😂
Even the FIA knows its boring AF. That's why it is no longer trying to shove it down our throats as much these days. 😂
Formula-E is out there - anyone watching it?
@@stevemawer848 Exactly my point. People who watch motorsports don't care about "sustainable fuel or racing"
@stevemawer848 a big part of the fE strategy is maintaining enough energy to finish. That was cool when I started watching, but it's restrictive. I really don't like it.
Every F1 rule change from the past fifteen years has been in the wrong direction. I have zero interest in electric go karts.
Then you simply have never been a fan of racing. You like sounds, and that’s okay. You can watch videos while us race fans watch racing.
@@EarendilStar I am a fan of racing. I'm not a fan of the FIA dictating the winner through rule changes. All they need to do is leave the rules alone and let the teams compete.
@@EarendilStar nice try at very bad gatekeeping, come again
@@GoatTheGoat But that’s not what you said, you said you have “zero interest” in a race car with a particular power train. Since racing is about race craft and driving a vehicle on the edge of adhesion, I fail to see how the drivetrain matters…except for the sound.
@@AdminAbuse I don’t think you know what Gatekeeping is. They’re the ones saying they want to stay on the other side of the gate; “no interest in watching”.
Bruh! This was SO meaty! Excellent information. I was just wondering if you lose leads when you book them on the calendar at a time inconvenient to them. I suppose they would just update their invitation from their email, right? That's the only question from a nearly 2 hour buffet. You rock, man. Seriously.
SUPER INTERESTING seeing a real American engineer using METRIC.
I'm so grateful to you for that
Good thing he still used horsepower 👍🇺🇸
Haha, pretty much all American engineers use metric behind closed doors, it's public facing material that gets translated.
The U.S. automotive industry has been fully metric for decades. In the '90's I was a Product Designer for a manufacturer of analytical instruments. Since the inception of the company in the early '80's the products had all been designed with U.S. traditional measurements and hardware. When given the primary responsibility for a new product line and also being aware that more than 50% of the company sale were to foreign countries I suggested that we switch to metric. The management was initially wary, worrying that it would increase cost. After the purchasing department looked into the matter it was determined that there was no cost impact and the switch was made. Attempting to do anything as simple as replacing an SAE threaded fastener in, e.g., Japan, is difficult. In the U.S. any hardware store has stocks of metric fasteners. These days any product made in China will be fully metric and American consumers can't get enough of them.
That's really good to know. It would be great if general public were to slowly change to metric. Is so frustrating that I can go almost everywhere in Europe, Asia and South America or elsewhere and measures are the same. Only when going to us is a mess with everything measure related.
I only understand miles because I love to drive but the first time I heard Fahrenheit apart from school I thought they were f*ing billing!
I can only dream...
Btw in Canada use imperial or metric?
Actually, for most circuits on the calendar, most of the harvest energy will come from part load harvesting where the engine is running against the MGUK to charge the energy storage. On tracks like Baku this will mean that none of the energy comes from “lifting” on straights but will come from part load harvesting and braking…
Thx for the step by step; wish you were my math teacher back in the day 🤗
Battery boost is used strategically, especially when coming out of a tight corner (sharp acceleration). It is usually not used in straights, unless there is an absolute need for it.
The math was good. I like.
I'm long out of school now though so had to think about some of those Force Drag equations again. I like the approach to all of this! Felt like a great way to analyze energy and deployment and lap times over a race. Great vid
All of these changes seem to be targeting improved overtaking opportunities at corners.
Basically under the new regs mid-corner speeds will compulsorily be slower (downforce, tyre width). The bigger the speed differential between the preceding straight and the apex, the greater the opportunity for overtaking, even more so if drivers are motivated to tinker with their braking intensity.
What the greater electric contribution achieves is probably better considered as torque rather than power. There will be more rapid acceleration out of corners, which should improve the show and help to recover lap time that's been sacrificed to the lower cornering speeds.
The cars being lighter and smaller will also help here.
Even if average speed across a lap ends up a bit lower there's going to be more decelerating and (faster) accelerating, making the cars' movement seem more violent and probably more exciting to watch even when running alone.
This is the first time I want to go back to school and do math again. Amazing. Thanks I love F1 and I never went past precal cause I got bored
This is brilliant! Thank you for your work.
The energy recovery will work not only in braking zones but in partial throttle operation. Getting rid of MGU-h they need to find good strategy to spool up the turbo. So the ICE will produce more power than the driver requests to both charge the battery and keep turbo spooled. You could just forgo this strategy and rely on electrical engine to compensate for the turbo lag. So on some tracks there will be more one or the other but it always will be combination of those two. I recon we will see a lot of fuel saving in races. It will be a more important factor than tires probably
Thank you. Interesting times ahead.
While I don’t like moving even further with the hybrid split I DO think “slower” cars that are faster in a straight line is the way to go. The ultimate pace comes from the freakish cornering ability but the cars just cannot race each other with that much aero. I’m fine if we never get cars that match the track times of things like the W11 again (especially if we get V8’s with eco fuels and smaller chassis 😁)
The point of active aero is to apply it in the straights, where you do need less drag and less downforce. But in cornering, you apply the other mode, where you get the downforce back. So the cars would not be 7 seconds slower on average in the corners. Am I missing something?
They have less downforce overall and narrower tires
Outstanding as always
You should also do a more in-depth video discussing the actual strategies that might be employed to win a race or respond to events that might be encountered.
I enjoy this type of video. I believe once the teams get accustomed to the new rules they will find new loopholes to make the cars faster than they are currently.
I love your explanation. But there's another factor that I'm missing.
Regenerating electrical energy goes through the rear axles MGU-K. While most of the kinetic energy dissapates through the front wheels.
And also in picking up 3x more energy from the rear shafts. It means it will become a headache to maintain the temperature in the rear brakes and tyres.
AFAICT, after reading the rules on the energy recovery system, there's nothing in the rules preventing the teams from using the ICE to generate e- power during the cornering phase. I.e. I think that it's possible for teams to recover kinetic energy from their momentum during braking, but also to generate additional power "to be recovered" from the ICE during cornering, when there is no energy recovery from braking, and when the ICE PU is not at full throttle.
Awesome video. Interested to see how close to the money you end up being. One thing I do notice with my car (ICE) that has a computer showing the kW, is whilst I can use 300+kW to accelerate quickly, on the motorway/freeway it'll tick along at less than a 100kW - often around 20-30. So _maybe_ we'll see very comparable times as the car rockets to top speed from the corner, then recharges the battery as the power needed to maintain vmax is less than what the ICE can pump out. Having said that - my vmax of 110kmh has significantly less drag than 300+kmh so maybe the ICE struggles to maintain that speed and has nothing spare to recharge.
This sounds like there will be more usable power over short durations and less weight vs lower top speed and less downforce. Will be interesting to see how this pans out. Of course the math will look really bad if we're looking at only the top speed and cornering speed with the same weight and energy recovery. It's more complicated than that. But it does give interesting insight into where the strategies might go in 2026. E.g. better strategies in deploying the power only during specific straights and at the beginning of those straights. etc.
Much as javelin designs had to change when 100m was reached (can't be impaling the audience, bad for ticket sales), rules in other sports need to deal with the real world, whether to address safety, or efficiency or even PR and spectacle. Life goes on, good teams work out how to use the rules and the best drivers deal with (or help develop) whatever they're sat in.
One of the interesting things about F1 is that the engineers eventually work out the limitations put on them with new rule changes. My expectation is that the cars will initially be slower but will eventually exceed current speeds. Whoever does a better job early on will have the advantage but then the lap times will converge.
Marvelous breakdown, as always! Thank you for sharing
I remember reading a few years ago that an engineer in F1 said they wish they can recover from the front wheels, too, just so that they have more energy recovery for more average power for the the entire race.
I'm still a bit devastated that they got rid of the MGU-H but I understand that it is so complex that it bars the entry for more manufacturers. Also, it's not like the MGU-H does all that much to control boost since they still have to use wastegates on long straights.
You can charge the Battery not only while or with braking but also with the ICE. For example during cornering.
One key thing is the active aero (drs 2.0) which you can enable at will. Cars will accellerate faster to the 345km limit for e-assited drive, and it will require less energy for the ice to maintain/accelerate beyond that.
Hope thats the key to solve the energy delta.
In my opinion they should increase delta and remove any caps for energy recovery.
Personally I think they should have electric drive on the fronts. Electric 4wd for cornering/acceleration + the greatest energy recovery.
Looks like ERS management will be a big factor in races in 2026, which IMO will create some really interesting racing strategy alongside the DRS changes.
Thanks for analysis 👍
The lower downforce also means there's less penalty in following another car through a corner. I would anticipate this will increase the amount of passing in a race. I would also speculate that the rule change was designed around that end (among other aims).
Amazing video and fantastic explanation. Love it ❤
Wow. That’s an amazing explanation. Thanks 👍
That was brilliant, thank you 👍
Sounds like a blast..
Great deep dive video though!
As much as I like closer racing, having limits such as BOP and power limits just feels really fake. What's the point of making the best car that you can when there's that anyway?