F1 technical guru issues championship warning ahead of 2026 season
By Simon Head
One of the most respected technical experts in Formula 1 has warned that the championship could be dominated by one team from 2026.
Adrian Newey, whose technical wizardry helped mastermind the development of Red Bull's multiple championship-winning cars over the last 18 years, is now set to embark on a new chapter in his career as a shareholder and managing technical partner of the Aston Martin Formula 1 team.
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A large focus on his role at Aston will be to help prepare the team for the upcoming F1 regulation changes for the 2026 season, which are expected to shake up the grid, with all of the teams set to effectively start from scratch as they look to build race-winning cars under a completely new set of regulations and restrictions.
And, in a sit-down conversation with Auto Motor und Sport, Newey issued a warning to the rest of F1 that the nature of the upcoming changes could result on one team dominating the championship in a similar vein to the era of dominance enjoyed by Mercedes at the start of the turbo hybrid era.
Mercedes drivers won seven consecutive F1 Drivers' Championships and eight successive F1 Constructors' Championships from 2014, as the turbo hybrid regulations came into effect in Formula 1.
And Newey thinks there's a strong possibility one team could take a stranglehold on the championship from 2026.
"I think there has to be a big chance that it's an engine formula at the start," he suggested.
"The reality is I can't remember another time in Formula 1 when both the chassis regulations and the engine regulations have changed simultaneously and where, in this case, the chassis regulations have been very much written to try to compensate for the power unit regulations. So, it's an extra dimension.
"I think engine manufacturers will have learned to an extent (from) the lack of preparation that the rivals to Mercedes did prior to that change.
"But there has to be a chance that one manufacturer will come out well on top and it will become a power unit-dominated regulation, at least to start with.
"And there's a chance that if it's on the combustion engine side of it, that somebody comes up with a dominant combustion engine, that will last through the length of the formula, because the way the regulations are written it's quite difficult for people who are behind to catch up. If it's on the electrical side, then there’s much more ability to catch up if you’re behind."
While at Red Bull, Newey had the tough task of challenging Mercedes' dominance, and his technical know-how helped the team become competitive, before eventually overhauling the German marque to capture two F1 Constructors' titles, while lead driver Max Verstappen won four consecutive F1 Drivers' Championships.
Now set to join Aston Martin as part of an ever-stronger team being assembled by team owner Lawrence Stroll, Newey is once again looking to find the edge against the championship's established big boys.
It's a move that rocked F1 when it was announced midway through the 2024 season, and one that even he admitted would have been a surprise to him a year earlier.
"If you'd said to me 12 months ago, would I be leaving Red Bull and then now ultimately starting again, I would have said, 'No, you're crazy!'.
"But, for various reasons, I felt I wouldn't be true to myself if I stayed at Red Bull. So the first difficult decision was exactly that. Do I stay at Red Bull, or not?
"I obviously came to the conclusion that, being honest with myself, I couldn't. And then, having made that decision, it was then what to do next."
Newey will officially take up his position at Aston Martin at the start of March, where team owner Stroll believes he can be a major piece in the jigsaw of what he hopes will become the strongest team in F1.
"Adrian is the best in the world at what he does – he is at the top of his game – and I am incredibly proud that he is joining the Aston Martin Aramco Formula 1 Team," said Stroll.
"It's the biggest story since the Aston Martin name returned to the sport and another demonstration of our ambition to build a Formula 1 team capable of fighting for world championships.
"As soon as Adrian became available, we knew we had to make it happen. Our initial conversations confirmed that there was a shared desire to collaborate in a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Adrian is a racer and one of the most competitive people I have ever met.
"When he saw what we have built at Silverstone – our incredible AMR Technology Campus, the talented group of people we have assembled and the latest wind tunnel in the sport – he quickly understood what we are trying to achieve.
"We mean business – and so does he. Adrian shares our hunger and ambition, he believes in this project, and he will help us write the next chapter in Aston Martin Aramco’s Formula 1 story."
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