FIA trick regulation to prevent 2026 power unit dominance – Whilst for now the 2025 season is nip and tuck between the pair of McLaren’s and Max Verstappen, the Miami Grand Prix may become the defining moment of the season before the teams head to their European homeland for ten rounds of Grand Prix racing.
As happened in Belgium and Las Vegas in 2024, the Mercedes car is suddenly looking like a race winner and with Kimi Antonelli the youngest ever pole sitter in an F1 race starting from pole in Saturday’s Sprint, Toto Wolff will be hoping his drivers can start to contend for race wins, rather than hope for podiums each weekend at best.
Lewis Hamilton appears to be getting to grips with his tricky Ferrari as he finished Sprint qualifying in P7, but was just under 2/10ths slower than his team mate who will start the short race form one place ahead of the former world champion.
Impossible weight target set
Yet come this time next year and F1 may become a flashback to 2014. One team may be uber dominant as were the Mercedes’ of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg who were easily half a second ahead of the field in qualifying. This time around the risk of getting it wrong, or that one team aces the new 2026 regulations are much higher. Rather than just regulate for a new engine Formula, the FIA and the manufacturers have agreed radical new chassis designs are required to manage the increase in power.
Add into the mix the long term strategic aims of the regulations to make the cars lighter and more nimble and this is an F1 examination set like non other in the sport’s 75 year history. The FIA promised when setting out its objectives for the 2026 cars to make them smaller in terms of their footprint, the modern versions having grown to truck like size.
Yet with the increase of the battery power being upped threefold, the weight of this heaviest of component will in fact raise the weight of the car significantly. Trade offs will have to be found elsewhere but there are now concerns in the paddock, that a number of teams will be no where near the minimum weight limit. Currently set at an all time high of 800kg, the minimum weight for 2026 has been regulated as follows. The cars must be a minimum of 726kg BUT this is before accounting for the weight of the qualifying tyres at 46.4kg which gives a total of 772.4gk, some 27 and bit less kg than the current cars.
10kg of weight on the current cars is calculated as being worth around a third of a second in lap time but a number of teams are currently right on the limit after four years with the current regulations. “At the moment it’s quite bad. It’s challenging,” says Haas F1 boss Ayao Kamastu.
Horner mocks FIA method for weight limit
Christian Horner was dismissive of the method used by the FIA to decide on the new F1 car’s minimum weights. “A number was plucked out of the air for car weight,” he said. “We’ve got engines that are significantly heavier and a car weight that has become lower. So it will be an enormous challenge for every team to achieve it.
“Saving weight costs a colossal amount of money. There was a discussion last week about introducing steel skids [to reduce sparks] – and maybe that would warrant adding 5kg to the minimum weight! But it is what it is.
“It’s the same for everybody. There will be choices teams make to hit the weight, because weight is free lap time. Every 10kg is about 0.35 seconds. It will be very challenging for all teams to get down to minimum weight.”
The teams will have huge decisions to make during the coming months as their focus turns to the massive challenge that is 2026. Current estimates are that certain designs for next year are currently between 10kg and 20kg over weight, which would mean a lap time cost of between 0.6-0.7 seconds.
Wolff admits weight limit ‘a challenge’
In terms of Sprint qualifying in Miami, this kind of weight penalty wold have seen pole sitter Kimi Antonelli behind eighth [place Alex Albon in the Williams. Weight is free lap time. Toto Wolff appears to take the opposite position to his arch rival from Red Bull, whenever the difficulties of the 2026 regulations are discussed.
He believes there’s no problem here and that the F1 teams will need to prioritise their expected achievements. “You make choices as a team,” he said. “How much lap time do you attribute to weight and ballast? Where do you want to save?
“You may compromise other performance parts if you want to reduce your weight, or the opposite. It is challenging. The reason we’re doing it is to make the cars nimbler. Is that something that was important? I think it was. We’ve got to start somewhere. That initial step is difficult, but it’s the same for everyone,” said the Mercedes boss.
Whilst concerns remain that one manufacturer’s 2026 powertrain blows away the opposition, the FIA’s optimistic minimum weight target may itself prove to be a key differentiator in terms of performance. The FIA has also toughened up the homologation tests for the chassis in 2026, this too will add a little weight to the team’s proposed cars.
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Big savings required to compensate for larger batteries
Red Bull’s chief engineer, Paul Monaghan made light of the challenge saying, “If we can get 5% off every component – crudely put – it’s 5% off the car. Suddenly 5% is a big number, isn’t it? It’s going to be expensive engineering to get the weight out of it. So we’ll try. We’ll have a go.” 5% would represent currently a 40kg reduction in weight and given the increase in battery mass for next year, this may well be what is required.
The Haas F1 team boss believes that in fact weight will have a significant impact on the competitive order come 2026. “Weight for sure will be a performance differentiator, and it’s very expensive development as well,” Ayao Kamastu explained.
“There are big performance differentiators everywhere – like weight, aero and power unit – but as long as they are balanced then I think that is OK. But if we go to race one and the PU is a 90% dominant factor then that’s not good. I hope these performance differentiators all get a role to play.”
Currently the FIA and F1 in collaboration are looking for an agreement from the teams on a method to improve performance equalisation should one team dominate or others completely miss the mark. Yet it could be the flakey minimum weight number for 2026, picked somewhat at random to fulfil a promise made some years ago, which prevents the likes of Mercedes from running away with it.
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Red Bull: McLaren tyre cheating again
Red Bull raises eyebrows again over McLaren’s tyre dominance as thermal camera data fuels fresh suspicions – The Formula One paddock is once again engulfed in controversy, and at the centre of the storm are two of the sport’s fiercest rivals: Red Bull Racing and McLaren. As the 2025 season progresses, McLaren’s unexpected supremacy in tyre management has drawn renewed scrutiny from Red Bull, with reports suggesting the Austrian outfit suspect foul play.
According to Auto, Motor und Sport journalist Michael Schmidt, Red Bull are using thermal imaging technology to understand how McLaren manage to keep their tyre temperatures so perfectly within the ideal operating window – an advantage that has proved crucial over several race weekends.
The underlying question remains: how does McLaren achieve such consistent grip and tyre stability across varying track conditions when the rest of the grid continues to struggle?…. READ MORE
With over 30 years of experience in Formula 1 as an insider journalist, I have built trusted connections across the paddock, from race engineers and mechanics to senior team figures. At The Judge 13, I and a handful of trusted colleagues share exclusive Formula 1 news, expert analysis and behind-the-scenes stories you will not find in mainstream motorsport media.
