Mar 08, 2026
3 min read
F1's pre-season has been dominated by criticism of its new rules, and while Australia opened the season boasting a number of passes, the criticism has not stopped.
MELBOURNE, Australia - It was easy to forget the excitement surrounding Formula 1 cars on the opening weekend of the 2026 season as George Russell and Charles Leclerc traded back and forth for the lead at the Australian Grand Prix over 12 glorious laps.
Both drivers, hoping this year will be the year they win their first driver's championship, delighted the Albert Park crowd with a number of passes at various points on the racecourse.Russell and Leclerc fought until the intervention of the Virtual Safety Car and the Mercedes was able to beat them - Ferrari does not want to do it in a Ferrari style - and ended the season's best in a one-two race with Kimi Antonelli in second.it happened in the end.
Their battle was manna from heaven for F1, which could be described as the brutal beginning of a new era of the sport: a redesigned car and, most controversially, a power unit with a 50-50 split between combustion and electric power.The brief but spectacular duel between Russell and Leclerc gave F1 a clear positive: despite all the negativity, the two teams fought for victory and bought seats on the track.
Formula 1 was quick to publish the statistics: In the first round last year there were 45 overtakes, on Sunday there was a proud figure of 120.Leclerc and Russell contributed seven of them in the first session.
It felt like a Jekyll and Hyde opening weekend.The good ones were great, the bad ones were terrible.And there were more bad ones.
The drivers had dissected the new formula after getting out of their cars following Saturday's qualifying;three world champions such as Max Verstappen, Lewis Hamilton and Lando Norris spoke about the cars in various ways.Norris had said that F1 had swapped the best and most entertaining cars for the worst ones, and there was certainly a noticeably negative atmosphere in the paddock after qualifying, exacerbated by Mercedes' dominant front-row stall.
Russell and Leclerc helped clear some of that gloom during their brief battle and Ferrari's blistering start could become a recurring feature in reviving racing this season.Seeing Leclerc's red racing car going forward into Turn 1 was exactly what F1 needed from a PR perspective after such a difficult few weeks.If this continues, the excitement over Ferrari getting a chance to end their title drought could only grow.could be enough to silence the hype surrounding these maligned new cars.
However, we shouldn't shy away from a good emphasis battle.As was the case after qualifying, the streak did not share the brilliance of the men fighting for the top spots.
Many drivers do not seem to have changed their minds, and some have found new ways to despise the revised F1.Although the battle for the leaders can be interpreted as a strong confirmation of the investment of power that is very important in the new power, that part of Sunday's race sounds like a criticism of Saturday.
Video game racing
At one point before the epic battle, Leclerc joked on the radio: "It's like a mushroom in Mario Kart."
This is a reference to the overtaking and acceleration mode buttons used by drivers during races.Both modes are part of a complex new hybrid engine and are a major selling point of the new regulations.
Unlike the old DRS system, drivers can use the boosts whenever they want, which F1 hopes will create strategic battles throughout the race.Russell calls it the "yo-yo effect" and his battle with Leclerc certainly felt like it as they took turns running against each other.Haas driver Oliver Bearman continued the theme after the race, saying, "Using the boost button makes me feel like a little video game."
Whether Formula 1 should feel like a video game is up for debate.While Saturday's criticism revolved around how overwhelming the qualifying lap at Albert Park was when drivers spent so much trying to save energy, Sunday's focus was on when drivers had to use it in battles with other cars.
There will be little debate about what the F1 world champion thinks of video game racing.When asked if the current acceleration methods on his fingers are artificial, Norris replied: "Too much. It's chaos, you're going to have a big accident. We're the ones waiting for something to happen and it's going to go very wrong, and it's not a good place to be, but there's nothing we can do about it now.
"It's a shame, it's very artificial, depending on what [the camera] decides to do and what it does randomly sometimes, you can be overtaken by five cars or you just can't do anything about it, so yes, we can't change anything about it, so there's no point in saying more.
Haas' Esteban Ocon shares Norris's doubts and frustrations and offers a different take on the exchange of positions and the future they face, although not televised.
"Very painful," he said of racing the new cars."It's painful because you can't do much as a driver. Once you use the boost button and you can't overtake, or even if you overtake, you're vulnerable again on the next straight. The other guy will overtake again, which happened to Pierre [Gasly] three times. It happened to [Gabriel Bortoleto] when I fought him twice.
Cynically, you could replace the names mentioned by Ocon with Russell and Leclerc and leave a very different (and less brilliant) description of the race for leadership.Criticism of the new formula and the new races it creates appears to be a matter of perspective based on how one driver compares to another in the competitive order.
While F1 is quick to release data on the number of overtakes, it does not include the number of passes after the driver has pressed boost mode.Given the massive emphasis on battery upgrades, you'll want to consider most, if not all, of them.
This raises a broader existential question about whether battery boosting has replaced one of the most revered and mythologized parts of wheel-to-wheel racing.Leclerc himself suggested as much when talking about his rivalry with Russell.
“I think it will definitely change the way we race and overtake,” he said. “It used to be about the bravest braking last.Maybe now there's a little more strategic thought in your every move.Because every time you activate the accelerator buttonYou know you will pay a high price after that.So you often try to think several steps ahead to try and finish first.But it's definitely a different way of competing.”
This sport touches on a bigger question: what Leclerc showed, what is Method 1?Perhaps it makes for a more strategic approach to the race, but Ayrton Senna wasn't celebrated because he can use the battery booster better than his rivals.Just one example, but the main idea from Sunday afternoon's press conference is that F1 has moved some of the skills drivers need when it comes to driving.catch.
"It's not natural, it's the way you approach it," Causley said, before giving a laundry list of how his job in the cockpit has changed now."It's more than driving. It's the battery. It's the power. [Power units], turn 1, turn 3 less, turn 6 more, the more you have to do for lift-off.
Obviously, this all happened after one race.Things can change and driving styles can adapt.Fans may gain a new appreciation for the added strategic sense that will obviously be needed to beat the competition, but after listening to many of the responses, it's not hard to recall Verstappen's initial criticism of the rules: They're like the all-electric series Formula E on steroids.
Verstappen really got the message across when he talked about how he wants to see the sport change in the coming weeks and months, and it's not hard to imagine one of the key elements missing from the thrilling wheel-to-wheel race.
“I love racing, but we can’t take much of it, can we?”" the furious Dutchman said on Sunday. "I think they are willing to listen, the FIA and F1, and I certainly hope that action will be taken. I mean, that's not the only thing I'm saying, I think a lot of people are saying it, if it's the drivers, the fans, we just want to do the best we can for the sport. It's not that we're criticizing just for the sake of criticizing, we're criticizing for a reason; we want thator F1, the real F1."
"It certainly didn't happen again today."
