2026 Formula 1 - I Love A Parade! #TheRealRacesAreNowOnSaturdays

Thank you for starting it in this forum style.
9 days until Drive to Survive

anyone have an opinion on the testing?

I've read two articles - one saying Red Bull looks to be the fastest car and the other saying the big 4 are all about equal

I don't know what to believe at this point. I think we'll all have to wait until the first race weekend to see what's what. I would be curious how many tenths per lap constitutes "about equal". If they are all close enough to where they wouldn't be able to pass each other, that could still be +/- many tenths per lap between teams.

Outside of the championship battles this year, I'm curious how Cadillac performs, and how Colton Herta performs in F2.

Much appreciated OP!

Cadillac look to be really behind - but not as embarassing as Aston Martin. Impressed with Audi so far tbh - not as far off as I was expecting. Gasly could really surprise now they have a decent engine

Does anyone have any predictions about how the move from IndyCar to F2 for Colton Herta will go? The clear plan is for him to earn enough superlicense points in F2 to qualify to drive in F1 for Cadillac next year.

If you look at Alex Palou, he's been lights out the best IndyCar driver for the past 5+ years. And even he was slated to be a benchwarmer's benchwarmer at McLaren.

Colton Herta has talent, but he's never been the best IndyCar driver at any point in his career. I expect his F2 career to go like Michael Andretti's F1 stint did decades ago. Go over with high expectations and ego, and get b****-slapped with reality.

What is that linking to? Why does it look stupid?

He made it because many posters can’t access the new thread format through their phones

I can’t

I'm ok with this thread. I didn't know I was creating it in the new shitty forum

Yes.

I had no idea your thread existed, sorry. I saw the request in the 2025 F1 thread to create a new 2026 thread and I did.

I think the two words I typed in the opening post speak volumes as to what this season may be like. Has anything been said publicly by the teams or the drivers that point to this season being "edge of your seat", crazy overtaking action? I certainly haven't heard any. All I've seen and heard are drivers talking about how incredibly difficult passing is going to be with this new package, and then talk about some teams allegedly bending the rules already.

Just a heads-up in case anyone in the USA is out of the loop as far as broadcasting changes for F1 starting this year. ESPN lost the rights to broadcast F1 races at the end of last season. This year, if you are a resident in the USA, you will need an Apple TV subscription in order to (legally) watch races.

I know if you have an existing Peacock membership, you can bundle Apple TV with Peacock and save money over having separate subscriptions. The same *may* be true for other streaming services, where you can save money by bundling Apple TV with some other existing streaming service.

That's one way to kill 10 years of momentum.

What happens if no one shows up for the 3 races?

Thanks for opening the thread anyway. And such a shame what that new format is doing to the forum

New season of netflix show dropped.

I have seen 5 episodes so far.

Episode 1 is about the rookies.
Episode 2 is about the team bosses of Kick Sauber and Alpine ending with Hulk's podium
Episode 3 is about McLaren and two number 1 drivers
Episode 4 is about Red Bull, Christian horner being sacked and Lawson being demoted. The real Horner issue isn't mentioned anywhere ever and they suggest it was a performance issue.
Episode 5 is about the struggles of Carlos @ Williams

I thought 1,5 were OK, other three were meh

They don't get into the spicy questionable stuff. They show the ridiculous house of Briatore but nothing about his shady past, also nothing about the shady scandal surrounding Horner and the aids Papaya team orders throughout the year. Netflix doesn't want to step on any F1 toes. Also Hulk deserved his own episode for his podium. **** them

Do you know kind of editorial control Netflix have? Or do F1 have right to veto any content/storylines?

Not sure why they made it only 8 episodes.

Apparently, Aston Martin cars are like a full body Sybian, not in a good way.

I suppose if they put F1 persons in bad light, people will stop collaborating with Netflix. There is a lot of staging going on.

yes. Albeit I think the show has benefitted F1 more than Netflix over it's lifetime so F1 would be reticent to pull out. But I'm sure there are guidelines at least

very interesting betting market for the weekend's race which shows what the market thinks of the different drivers, the different teams and how they view the gap between the drivers on the same team

George a clear favourite at $2.85 (his teammate Kimi at $9 is a huge gap for an established teammate)
Max second favourite at $4.40 with his teammate Hadjar at $101!!!!
Charles $5.70, Lewis $8.25
Lando $10.50 Oscar $15

Gasly next best at $151