re: 2026 Formula 1 (F1) Season Thread

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Damn near every formula starts this way with a dominate car.

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And every season we have winners throughout the entire year with 30 second wins

And you can't really use the "people made shite car argument" when Ferrari def didn't make a shite car this year and lost by 25 seconds.

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This is exactly what F1 is.

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Exactly... So the new regs did nothing to combat the front 1-2 teams running away by 30 seconds like some have claimed.

Some F1 comments from drivers/others:

Reports suggest that FIA will consider increasing the contribution of the internal combustion engine to overall power output from 50% to 60%, in an attempt to quell fan backlash

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Max Verstappen: “Maybe some fans like it, but they don’t understand racing. I hope they don’t think that way, because in the end it will end up ruining the sport.”

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Max Verstappen: “It’s not fun at all — it’s like playing Mario Kart. You boost past someone and then run out of battery on the next straight, and they boost past you again. For me it’s just a joke.”

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Fernando Alonso: “Right now we have a World Championship of batteries.”

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Max Verstappen: “It’s a joke. If someone thinks this is fun, then you don’t know what racing is all about.”

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Max Verstappen: “I had the same problem as yesterday at the start so we were last, then we had to retire the car with an ERS cooling issue — and before that I already had a lot of degradation and graining.”

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Fernando Alonso: “Four cars didn’t even take the start — that’s probably the worst spectacle you can give.”

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X LINK

Here’s more thorough Max comments:


RBR Hub
@RBRHub

Max Verstappen on the new generation of F1 cars:

"This has nothing to do with racing. I would say the same if I were winning races, because I care about the product of racing.
It’s not about me being angry about where I am. Right now I’m actually fighting even harder, so you understand even better what you have to do and what it’s about. But for me, it’s really a big joke."

> On what changes can be made to the regulations

“You can adjust a little bit, but it is fundamentally flawed.”

> On a quick switch back to V8 engines as a solution

"Yes, but I don’t see that happening next year. It’s painful."

> Max on his conversation with Stefano Domenicali

"Well, you have to be a bit careful about what you say. We’ve talked about it."
"I think they understand what we drivers have been saying. I think I speak on behalf of most drivers. Some will of course say it’s great because they are winning races, and that’s fine. If you have an advantage, why would you give it up? Because you never know if you will ever have a good car again. But if you just talk with most drivers, then it’s not what we like. I don’t think real Formula 1 fans like it. Maybe some fans like it, but they don’t understand motorsport, and hopefully we can get rid of this as soon as possible."

> Max on whether Liberty Media understands the sport or mainly focuses on money

"I hope they don’t think that way, because that will eventually ruin the sport. It will end up costing them dearly.
But as far as I’m concerned, as long as we can communicate with them and make sure we work on solutions, that will already help a lot. However, it will also be very difficult to get everyone to agree. Not everyone has to agree, but most people have to agree in order to push through changes.
But like I said, it’s politics. Some people think they have an advantage now and of course want to use that. Fair enough, I understand that — I’m not stupid. But at the same time, if you look at it from the perspective of the sport, it’s just not good."

> Max Verstappen on whether drivers should be more involved in regulation changes

"Yes, I would like that, but I don’t think that will happen. They should have listened already in 2023 to see this coming. Unfortunately they didn’t, but maybe it’s a lesson for the future so that this never happens again. That would be great."

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Porsche was one of the big proponents of the 50/50 balance as well.

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WTF?


Well I know Porsche is turning the GT3RS to a turbo next year, which sucks... However, the new Turbo S just became the fastest 0-60 production car at 2 seconds and pumping out 700hp.

Remember Porsche is Audi (in a manner of speaking) and their push was also front wheel regen. Which would probably make racing better.

the belief iz Audi is just light-years ahead of everyone on front wheel regen. So the other teams vetoed that reg.

I think everyone thought an engine heavy formula would favor Merc and Ferrari as it had in the past. So not that big of a surprise.

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Well I know Porsche is turning the GT3RS to a turbo next year, which sucks...

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Wouldn’t that be a GT2??

All right, the TD F1 Championship results are in!

dg42.net/TDF1/race-results.php?race=2

The winner of the TD F1 Chinese Grand Prix is MikeD, (unfortunately) the winner of the first two races of the year.

The podium is filled out by MississippiLebowski in P2 and pitstop in P3.

Congrats to the players scoring their first points of the season: auisssa, billjamin, Greace, and Gulf Coast Tiger.

Here's the championship table: dg42.net/TDF1/index.php

It's starting to resemble last year, when sorantable ended up dominating for over half the season. MikeD already has a commanding lead. We need other guys to step it up and start winning races. Looks like we also have to reel in last year's champion pitstop.

CORRECTION

Sorry, I had to recalculate Race 1 because I made a mistake. There were two DNS in Australia, Piastri and Hulkenberg. I had scored them as if they had finished P21 and P22, but the predictions for those two drivers should have scored 0 points. The same 10 players scored the championship points, but the order got shuffled around a little bit.

Last year, no race had more than one DNS. There were a couple of races where I scored a DNS driver as P20 instead of giving 0 points like I should have. It wasn't until this year seeing multiple DNS drivers per race that I realized the mistake.

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Wish Max was up closer to the front being a menace in this situation.

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Please. We've seen enough of Max winning. I'm okay if he retires from F1 without winning another race ever again.