Formula 1 2026 Season Discussion

Forums › Sports › Formula 1 2026 Season Discussion

1 | ... | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20

30110 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9551

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3487136 3-May-2026 18:14

Prediction time

No idea at all

Mercedes look great then not so much, same for Ferrari. McLaren's upgrades look great. Max seems to have mastered the car, but a 10/10 effort just gets him into some contention

Kimi looks awesome. Puts George under huge pressure. I predict wth confidence that Kimi will outpoint George this year, by a reasonable margin. Generational talent? Maybe, but aside from inexperience, he is faster than George. Experience is great, but mph is better

Liam did enough to get to SQ2 but the Albon issue was too late. He's going well, Alpine are now a thorn for Racing Bulls.

Not hard to see the top 4 teams will compress a lot sooner than generally expected this season

TwoSeven

1723 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 305

Subscriber

#3487153 3-May-2026 19:26

bigreddog:

Which is exactly my point. The whole 50/50 ICE/electricity argument from FIA/FOM is totally pointless - using more fuel, and therefore less electric……

The idea one can run more fuel I don't think is accurate. The engine runs 124kg of fuel, putting 150Kg would just leave nearly 30Kg unused and make the car slower.

the electric motor is a separate unit from the engine, its purpose it to generate torque (acceleration)

watching the sprint race at Miami, my suggestion is more to do with traction and tyre temps.

Software Engineer
(the practice of real science, engineering and management)
A.I. (Automation rebranded)
Gender Neutral
(a person who believes in equality and who does not believe in/use stereotypes. Examples such as gender, binary, nonbinary, male/female etc.)

...they/their/them...

JPNZ

1760 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 876

#3487205 4-May-2026 08:11

The move forward in race time caught me out, I was all excited to watch at work at 8am. Guess its the replay for me haha

Panasonic 65GZ1000, Onkyo RZ730, Atmos 5.1.2, AppleTV 4K, Nest Mini's, PS5, PS3, MacbookPro, iPad Pro, Apple watch SE2, iPhone 15+

Handsomedan

7903 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7627

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#3487221 4-May-2026 08:39

Lawson causing carnage. Looks like a failure in the car lost him his ability to brake as he got passed on a corner.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/360973723/liam-lawson-involved-spectacular-crash-miami-grand-prix

Handsome Dan Has Spoken.
Handsome Dan needs to stop adding three dots to every sentence...

Handsome Dan does not currently have a side hustle as the mascot for Yale

*Gladly accepting donations...

tdgeek

30110 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9551

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3487228 4-May-2026 08:57

Handsomedan:

Lawson causing carnage. Looks like a failure in the car lost him his ability to brake as he got passed on a corner.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/360973723/liam-lawson-involved-spectacular-crash-miami-grand-prix

Yeah, gearbox failed and put him in neutral, bad luck

for both of them

Benoire

2892 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 701

#3487240 4-May-2026 09:36

Drive through penality for Leclerk after his final lap issues - leaving the track multiple times has been considered given him a lasting advantage as the car couldn't turn right very well apparently.

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

thermonuclear

751 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 603

#3487241 4-May-2026 09:36

Crap end to a bad weekend for Lawson and Lindblad. Lawson initially reported he tried to brake and thought the car had gone into anti-stall mode. Then in and out of gear as he limped through a lap back to the pits. Lindblad was suffering clutch problems all weekend.

Will be interesting to hear what the outcome is when the Kiwi and Racing Bulls come before the Stewards to present the evidence and argue their case. Looked scary from Lawson's car as Gasly was starting his flip. A little surprised Lawson didn't ask after Gasly at all while making his way back to the garage but I guess he had plenty else on his mind.

Also interesting how Verstappen was barging his way through the field with impunity. Thought it was a borderline call from Lawson's race engineer to tell him to give the place back to Verstappen. The Dutchman probably would have got Lawson soon enough if he'd held onto the place, and it looked like Verstappen didn't leave him anywhere to go and braked too late to complete the pass safely anyway. Different set of rules for the top/popular drivers.

Another three weeks until Canada now, this season has stalled as badly as the new regulations.

thermonuclear

751 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 603

#3487250 4-May-2026 10:05

thermonuclear:

Will be interesting to hear what the outcome is when the Kiwi and Racing Bulls come before the Stewards to present the evidence and argue their case.

Should have checked the FIA website, the decision has already been handed down. Fair enough too, won't stop all the anti-Lawson sentiment though no doubt.

Fact
Collision between cars 30 and 10 in Turn 17.

Infringement
Alleged breach of Appendix L, Chapter IV, Article 2 d) of the FIA International
Sporting Code.

Decision
No further action.

Reason
The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 30 (Liam Lawson), the driver of Car 10
(Pierre Gasly), team representatives and reviewed positioning/marshalling system
data, video, telemetry, team radio and in-car video evidence.

Car 10 (Pierre Gasly), was attempting an outside pass of Car 30 (Liam Lawson) at
the entry to Turn 17. Car 10 was clearly ahead prior to the apex and had established
its rights under the Driving Standards Guidelines. A significant collision occurred and
Car 10 was pushed into the barriers, with the car flipping and ending up wedged in the
TechPro.

The driver of Car 30 explained that just before the collision, he had a technical issue
as his gearbox failed under braking. The Stewards reviewed the in-car data and
telemetry and confirmed that there was clearly a gearbox failure just before the
incident in question. The radio communications were also consistent with the fact that
there was a gearbox failure.

We therefore accept the driver’s explanation that this was a failure of a mechanical
part in the car and that there was nothing that he could do to avoid the collision.
We also considered whether the driver of Car 30 had the ability to anticipate the
failure of the gearbox and decided that it would not have been possible for him to do
so.

Under the circumstances, the stewards determine that a mechanical failure, not
driver error, was the cause of the collision and therefore the driver of Car 30, was not
at fault for the collision. We therefore took no further action.

mudguard

2359 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1274

#3487272 4-May-2026 11:05

Benoire:

bigreddog:

Which is exactly my point. The whole 50/50 ICE/electricity argument from FIA/FOM is totally pointless - using more fuel, and therefore less electric which therefore means requires less lift and coast & superclipping to generate the battery charge won't make any difference to anyone anywhere, but they can't do that as they have now got caught in this circular argument now and the cars just aren't physically capable of running a Grand Prix distance with the size of the fuel tanks they have, so they are stuck in this restrictive generate electricity to keep performance...

As far as i understand it, the FIA/FOM wanted front axle regen as well but it was vetoed by the other teams as Audi have significant experience in this from WEC and they thought they would be at a disadvantage... doing this would have enabled significantly better regen opportunties and not relied on 'super clipping' to generate all the electrical power.

Of the course the big risk of energy recovery from the front is sending it back out again...

I do think F1 is at a bit of a crossroads. It's safe to say that 20k rpm NA monsters aren't coming back while the car manufacturers are involved. So the question is, could F1 survive without them?

I admit I was surprised that in the switch to 50/50 ish that they left the battery capacity the same. To be blunt I didn't like the switch to small capacity turbos anyway, the sounds has been nullified.

tdgeek

30110 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9551

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3487287 4-May-2026 11:39

While we all have issues with deploy etc, the racing is close. Once all drivers get up to speed with battery management, that will help as well, but close racing is what we have missed for a long time

JPNZ

1760 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 876

#3487295 4-May-2026 12:03

I see Leclerc copped a penalty down to 8th after the race. McLaren will be disappointed not to win that one. GG Kimi

Panasonic 65GZ1000, Onkyo RZ730, Atmos 5.1.2, AppleTV 4K, Nest Mini's, PS5, PS3, MacbookPro, iPad Pro, Apple watch SE2, iPhone 15+

Samsung

Shop now on Samsung phones, tablets, TVs and more (affiliate link).

Benoire

2892 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 701

#3487296 4-May-2026 12:08

I'm loving that Kimi is beating Russell. Normally I'd be going for the brit driver all the time given I am a brit but for some reason I can't stand George at all so it amuses me to see young kimi doing the business... I am also impressed by Kimi anyway, so don't let my dislike of russell take away from Kimis talent, but its fun to watch!

tdgeek

30110 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9551

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3487313 4-May-2026 13:04

Benoire:

I'm loving that Kimi is beating Russell. Normally I'd be going for the brit driver all the time given I am a brit but for some reason I can't stand George at all so it amuses me to see young kimi doing the business... I am also impressed by Kimi anyway, so don't let my dislike of russell take away from Kimis talent, but its fun to watch!

100% he is super super solid

George is now Team Leader but No.2 driver IMO

Jaxson

8198 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1351

Trusted

#3487373 4-May-2026 15:32

tdgeek:

George is now Team Leader but No.2 driver IMO

Yep elevated to team lead only because Lewis departed, but saw himself as the future etc

Ragnor

8288 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 592

Trusted

#3487910 5-May-2026 23:36

Jaxson:

tdgeek:

George is now Team Leader but No.2 driver IMO

Yep elevated to team lead only because Lewis departed, but saw himself as the future etc

Lewis hasn't really performed since 2021, George was the better driver in the same machinery 2022-2024

Quite strange to see George struggling so much this year but it's only been a few races, it's a long season just ask Oscar about last year.

1 | ... | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20