2026 F1 Cars - General Thread

[BorisTheBlade]

You are right.
I just have the strong feeling (emphasis on feeling), that in an energy starved formula everyone will try to burn the max. permitted amount of fuel/energy as much as they can - either for powering the wheels or to send it to the ES. I expect this to far outweigh the benefits of carrying a bit less fuel.
But as you say, this needs quite some examination. Surely, all the Teams will already known the best approach and I am quite excited to find out which route they will take.

[Badger]

Not to be nitpicky, but I am 99,9% sure, that they will not lift and cost. Instead, they will use super-clipping (full-throttle-recovery), as this nets you the most energy per laptime-loss, so to say.

You can only do 250kW of "super-clipping", so it still makes sense to maximise the braking zone where you can get the full 350kW, and the way to do that is to elongate it. It will resemble something like LiCo with very strong engine braking.

Do we agree on the following? Cornering aside, there are really only two operating modes you want a racecar in, in order to get around a track as fast as you can. These are "applying maximum power" and "braking as late and as hard as you possibly can".
As this will not be possible for energy starved cars, you need to look to the next best options.
With super-clipping, you recover 250 KW and have 150 KW of forward power and have 30% drag reduction.
With your lift and coast (IMHO kind of a one-pedal-driving) you get 350 KW recovery, 0 KW forward power and 42% more drag.
Although to be 100% sure, calculations or even simulations would be needed. But simply looking at these numbers, I fail to see how the second one would be better for laptime. It is a bit like saying "if you brake less, you can drive through the corner faster".
Or am I missing something?

I am not sure they will need to close SLM to do LiCo harvesting, there was a post discussing this a few days back that seemed to suggest SLM does not automatically close just because you drop the throttle. For now I will operate under this assumption.

It's not obvious that braking as fast as possible is conducive to the best lap time anymore. The purpose of the braking event is now two-fold. Firstly to slow down for the corner, and secondly to regenerate energy for the battery. To harvest as much energy as possible you want the 350kW MGU-K to do most of the braking. Every kW of energy that is zapped by the carbon brakes is a kW you can't deploy on the rest of the lap. This makes the equation of how to get the best overall lap time much more complicated.

Example 1: Apply the brakes fully at 100m. Let's say you get one second of full 350kW regen this way.

Example 2: Let go of the throttle at 150m, only rely on the K to slow you down for the first 75m, then use the full braking. Let's say you get two seconds of full 350kW regen this way.

So in example 2 you've lost a certain amount of time in the braking zone (less than a second time loss probably), but now you have an extra second to deploy 470 hp anywhere you like. Which is faster? It's not a simple equation and it may vary by track, but my intuition tells me that example 2 will be faster on many tracks, especially energy starved ones like Monza and Spa where you can really use that deployment early in the straight.

[BorisTheBlade]

Regarding LiCo and SLM, this is really ridiculous. In this article, F1 states, that wings will close under LiCo:
"The only Recharge mode the driver will have direct control of will be lift-off regen, whereby if the driver lifts off, then they can Recharge. However, doing this will disable the Active devices as well. In contrast, super clipping is still at full throttle and therefore the Active Aero will still be ‘open’."
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... cIpGzoWkY0

However, as you rightly pointed out, they just deleted the section of the regulations where they mandated SLM to end under certain conditions like braking.

Regarding your examples: Yes, it's really just a feeling from my side as I am just too lazy to think about how to determine this in a scientific way - especially as we all will just see it in a month. It might have been a different story, if today was February 2025

[AR3-GP]

"Super clipping"? Unserious sport

[karana]

Not to be nitpicky, but I am 99,9% sure, that they will not lift and cost. Instead, they will use super-clipping (full-throttle-recovery), as this nets you the most energy per laptime-loss, so to say.

You can only do 250kW of "super-clipping", so it still makes sense to maximise the braking zone where you can get the full 350kW, and the way to do that is to elongate it. It will resemble something like LiCo with very strong engine braking.

Do we agree on the following? Cornering aside, there are really only two operating modes you want a racecar in, in order to get around a track as fast as you can. These are "applying maximum power" and "braking as late and as hard as you possibly can".
As this will not be possible for energy starved cars, you need to look to the next best options.
With super-clipping, you recover 250 KW and have 150 KW of forward power and have 30% drag reduction.
With your lift and coast (IMHO kind of a one-pedal-driving) you get 350 KW recovery, 0 KW forward power and 42% more drag.
Although to be 100% sure, calculations or even simulations would be needed. But simply looking at these numbers, I fail to see how the second one would be better for laptime. It is a bit like saying "if you brake less, you can drive through the corner faster".
Or am I missing something?

About the 350kW recovery under lift and coast, I'm not sure that is even possible, due to

C5.12.3: At any given engine speed, the minimum torque in the driver torque demand map must be a
negative value greater than the minimum curve defined as Torque (Nm) = −0.0027 * engine speed
(rpm) − 30.

That limits (as I understand this rule) the engine braking to less than 100kW. You could get more recovery from the MGU-K by running the ICE at positive power of course, but that does seem limited by the following rule:

C5.2.5: At partial load, the fuel energy flow must not exceed the limit curve defined below:
EF (MJ/h) = 380 when the engine power is equal to or below −50kW
EF (MJ/h) = 9.78 x engine power (kW) + 869 when the engine power is above −50kW

380 MJ/h would be ~13% of the maximal fuel energy flow, so you would not get much more than 50kW out of the ICE.
Basically you can get more recovery at full throttle than by lift and coast (IF that is true).

Maybe zero throttle does not count as partial load, but that would surprise me.

[dialtone]

Regarding LiCo and SLM, this is really ridiculous. In this article, F1 states, that wings will close under LiCo:
"The only Recharge mode the driver will have direct control of will be lift-off regen, whereby if the driver lifts off, then they can Recharge. However, doing this will disable the Active devices as well. In contrast, super clipping is still at full throttle and therefore the Active Aero will still be ‘open’."
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... cIpGzoWkY0

However, as you rightly pointed out, they just deleted the section of the regulations where they mandated SLM to end under certain conditions like braking.

Regarding your examples: Yes, it's really just a feeling from my side as I am just too lazy to think about how to determine this in a scientific way - especially as we all will just see it in a month. It might have been a different story, if today was February 2025

The elimination of the rule doesn’t mean it won’t happen, it can mean that it won’t be the only case where it happens and the details of which are covered somewhere else.

I’m surprised LiCo will close though as it reduces how much energy can be collected, technically drag will take a chunk of that energy now.

[PlatinumZealot]

RB22 has very little anti-dive on the front control arms. Very notable considering they were one of the main proponents of extreme anti-dive. Leads me to believe they have found something somewhere else and the other teams are missing a trick.

[AR3-GP]

Norris

I liked the car to drive in Barcelona. It is of course different than usual, that we will have to get rid of the gas in qualifying sessions with an eye on the battery. That's not how I grew up and certainly creates challenges.

Piastri

"I also think that the fan does not notice a lot of things. It's now a lot about lift and coast (letting go of the throttle before the ideal braking point, ed.), but we did that before. Although the biggest difference will be that we now have to do the same in qualifying

https://www.telegraaf.nl/sport/autospor ... aign=share

[ScottB]

Given the cars are going to be generally 'energy starved' will that change qualifying, in that previously, cars went as slow as they could on the outlap, to save the tyres, but presumably doing that sort of thing now, won't be enough to fully charge the battery? Will they have to push harder on the outlap to do that, which could impact favoured tyre choice even?

[Stu]

RB22 has very little anti-dive on the front control arms. Very notable considering they were one of the main proponents of extreme anti-dive. Leads me to believe they have found something somewhere else and the other teams are missing a trick.

Could it be that the trick is that they are relying much less on traditional braking? There have been people quoted from the brake manufacturers that teams have requested smaller calipers, etc; could a heavier dependence on the MGU-K braking (only operating through the rear axle) that results in a change of dynamic forces reacted through the front suspension?
Going back to 2021, the last time that rake was a useful tool, they ran significantly less anti-dive.

[matteosc]

RB22 has very little anti-dive on the front control arms. Very notable considering they were one of the main proponents of extreme anti-dive. Leads me to believe they have found something somewhere else and the other teams are missing a trick.

Could it be that the trick is that they are relying much less on traditional braking? There have been people quoted from the brake manufacturers that teams have requested smaller calipers, etc; could a heavier dependence on the MGU-K braking (only operating through the rear axle) that results in a change of dynamic forces reacted through the front suspension?
Going back to 2021, the last time that rake was a useful tool, they ran significantly less anti-dive.

The longitudinal load transfer only depends on the actual deceleration and not on which axis are you using more for breaking. Less dive would only be a result of breaking less intensly. It could be that they decided to sacrifice the breaking performance to regenerate more power, but I think that less anti-dive is likely due to:
1) Less sensitivity of this new car generation to floor height
2) Less overall downforce, resulting in less breaking ability
3) Suspension arms positioning mainly for aerodynamic purposes, anti-dive effect only secondary

[PlatinumZealot]

Could also be that they are going to keep the rear wing more loaded (shut earlier after DRS) than the frong wing upon braking? Also how the shocks and springs are set up can compensate for the dive obviously. So a lot of interesting things to uncover.

[FittingMechanics]

Given the cars are going to be generally 'energy starved' will that change qualifying, in that previously, cars went as slow as they could on the outlap, to save the tyres, but presumably doing that sort of thing now, won't be enough to fully charge the battery? Will they have to push harder on the outlap to do that, which could impact favoured tyre choice even?

This is not possible for the simple reason that you are allowed to "store" 4 MJ of energy in the battery (difference between highest and lowest charge) but with the rules, you can use about 8.5 MJ of energy per lap. So you can't make the full lap without recharging.

Not sure why they just didn't increase the allowed storage capacity of the battery. It would be simpler if they could run qualy laps without recharge.

[FittingMechanics]

Could also be that they are going to keep the rear wing more loaded (shut earlier after DRS) than the frong wing upon braking? Also how the shocks and springs are set up can compensate for the dive obviously. So a lot of interesting things to uncover.

I don't think this is legal.

[Rikhart]

"Super clipping"? Unserious sport

This set of regulations is just completely mad, it's band-aids covering other band-aids, for self-inflicted cuts. And it's all extremely obtuse and complicated, I wouldn't want to be a F1 Commentator, just imagine trying to describe all this malarkey to random people who just want to watch fast cars?

"Well, you see, he is now going slower to go faster later on, and the wings can now be open and go into MODE X, but wait, we are now in MODE VF - Are you sure Martin, the frequency of the brake lights indicate it could be MODE 667FH!"