Lance Stroll calls F1 2026 rules ‘sad’ and fundamentally flawed
Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll
Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll launched a fierce attack on the F1 2026 regulations, claiming that the sport is “miles off” where it should be.
Stroll spoke of testing “1,000 times more fun” Formula 3 machinery during the break before Miami, and expressed hope that the sport will move back towards its former era of screaming V10 and V8 engines. Stroll does at least hope that the regulatory tweaks made in time for Miami will make these cars “more normal to drive”.
Lance Stroll brands F1 2026 ‘sad’ situation
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Formula 1’s new era, with its near 50/50 split between electrical and internal combustion engine power, is failing to win over a large section of the grid.
During the April break, various tweaks were made to the regulations in time for the Miami Grand Prix, in an effort to encourage more flat-out driving.
Ahead of the Miami GP, Stroll was asked by PlanetF1.com’s Thomas Maher how much of an impact he believes the energy management rule changes will have.
“Hopefully it’s better with the part throttle and all this stuff,” he said.
“It’s just destroying the racing, the qualifying laps.
“So hopefully it’s a bit more normal to drive, we don’t have to think too much about all the management and lift and coast and how much throttle we’re putting on and all this stuff.
“But I think we’re still far away from proper F1 cars and pushing flat out without thinking about batteries.”
Put to him that he sees the changes as a band-aid solution then, Stroll confirmed: “I think so.
“I think we’re miles off of where we should be.”
In his time off during the pre-Miami break, Stroll said he was “randomly watching old races and stuff.
“I even had the Monaco historics on the TV, and I heard some Ferrari cars from early 2000s and how good they sounded, and how small and nimble they were.
“And there were some onboards I saw from the early, or even mid 2000s in the V8 or V10 era.
“And then what it looks like versus now. It came up on my phone, and I was watching it, and you hear what it’s like now, and the character of the cars, just how much more intense it looked and how much more exciting it looked back then compared to now.
“It’s sad. But hopefully we’re heading back in that direction.”
Stroll was asked whether he feels that Formula 1 is heading in that direction, a future which would see the sport go back to elements of its past.
FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem has previously expressed a desire for the sport to go back to V8 engines. The FIA’s Nikolas Tombazis has said that the sport “cannot be hostage” to manufacturers in the next generation engine debate.
“I hear rumours about it for the next regs,” Stroll claimed, “but now we’re going to have to live with these ones for the next three or four years.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen, but hopefully we go back in that direction, those loud, fast, light, nimble machines that are exciting for the fans, exciting for the drivers, you really feel like you’re pushing on the limit.”
Asked if anything can be done before the next engine cycle, beginning from 2031, Stroll stated: “I think it’s fundamentally just so flawed.
“I’m not an engineer. Maybe there’s a lot of things that can be done.
“It’s sad that we’re in this situation.”
Asked if these Formula 1 cars are enjoyable to drive, Stroll said: “No, F1 is not so fun to drive.
“I drove other cars over the break. I tested some F3 cars, and it’s like 1,000 times more fun and better to drive, because your right foot, you get what you want.
“And even the weight of the car. Something like 550, 650 kilos is a lot nicer than 750, 800 plus kilos.
“Things like that just make cars fun to drive, and then the sound and the noise, I mean, I’m saying it, but everyone that hears a car from the V8 era, V10 era, is going like, ‘Wow, that’s amazing. That’s F1’. Then you hear it now, the derating going into a corner, downshifting going into a corner with no character, no noise.”
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Despite the driver concerns, F1 president Stefano Domenicali has defended the current cars, while Tombazis said that the sport was not in “intensive care”.
“Because F1 is a business, and they want to protect their business and make it look good,” Stroll claimed as the reasoning for that stance.
“And we’re drivers, and we know what it feels like to drive good cars. So there’s two different perspectives on it.
“And people are watching the sport, no matter what, and watching the Netflix and turning on Formula 1, and so F1 is happy.
“But the drivers, the fans, the people that really know about racing, and know what it was before, the drivers that know what it’s like to drive really good, proper cars, there’s no hiding behind the fact that right now, it’s not as good as it can be.
“It is what it is, but we saw it coming. Everyone said for the last year and a half, or however long it’s been, everything that it was looking like, and adding these batteries and taking off downforce from the car to support the batteries and all this stuff, was not looking good.
“Now it’s just we got what we expected to have.
“It’s probably more frustrating for Aston Martin than for Mercedes right now.
“It is what it is. Hopefully, it gets better.”
Additional reporting by Thomas Maher
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