Five years ago, I started this site after seeing the direction taken by the current F1 management and reading the first drafts of what would become the 2026 Formula 1 regulations and wrote a manifesto.
It wasn’t particularly subtle. It wasn’t particularly diplomatic.
It also, inconveniently for everyone currently pretending to be surprised, turned out to be right.
Back then, the warning signs were already there: more complexity, more artificial constraints, more “show” packaged as innovation.
Fast forward to 2026 and we’ve finally achieved the dream: Formula 1 cars that are neither flat-out nor particularly about racing.
Drivers lifting and coasting, juggling energy like they’re playing a mobile game, and describing the experience in glowing terms such as not fun.
We were promised closer racing. We got battery management competitions. We were promised a new era. We got a spreadsheet.
Even drivers have called it “anti-racing” and warned it’s drifting away from what Formula 1 is supposed to be.
And yet, somehow, the official line is: calm down, everything is fine, please keep consuming.
Because that’s what this is really about, isn’t it?
Not racing. Not competition. Not even engineering excellence in the traditional sense. It’s about selling a product: to investors, to manufacturers, to markets that couldn’t care less about apex speeds but love the words sustainable narrative.
The regulations read less like a sporting rulebook and more like a pitch deck.
We’ve built a Formula 1 where the primary KPI isn’t who’s fastest.
But redesigning the cars into something barely recognisable wasn’t enough.
Now we’re also redesigning the conversation.
Criticise the regulations? Your comments mysteriously disappear. Entire threads quietly buried. Fans have already noticed that criticism of the 2026 rules is being hidden or removed on official channels.
Even investigations of dangerous racing incidents are buried, barely communicated, barely discussed.
Nothing says “we’re confident in our product” quite like aggressively filtering anyone who points out its flaws.
And it doesn’t stop there. Over the past couple of years, we’ve seen increasing control over what drivers can say, how they say it, and even whether they’re allowed to express themselves at all.
So now we have a Formula 1 where:
- The cars aren’t really about racing
- The rules are shaped around commercial interests
- And the conversation is carefully curated to avoid discomfort
At this point, calling it “managed entertainment” would be generous.
Domenicali and all those who created this should leave immediately.
Not because things are imperfect; Formula 1 has always been imperfect.
But because the core of the sport is being traded away in exchange for something safer, more marketable, and infinitely more forgettable.
Add censorship to that list, and it stops being just a bad direction; it becomes an unacceptable one.
If the vision of Formula 1 is one where criticism is hidden, drivers are frustrated, and racing is secondary to messaging, then that vision needs replacing.
And yes, let’s also talk about the chorus of silence around all of this.
The influencers. The YouTubers. The journalists. The former drivers.
The ones with paddock access, soft questions, and carefully maintained relationships. The ones who will nod along, repeat the press release, and call it analysis; all while pretending this is progress.
Because calling it out might cost them a credential, an invite, or a few thousand views.
It’s not that they don’t see the problems. It’s that they’ve decided it’s more profitable not to.
And honestly, that might be the most predictable part of all.
Five years ago, this trajectory was obvious.
It was written into the DNA of the regulations before a single car hit the track.
None of what we’re seeing now is surprising.
It was inevitable.
All Along The Racetrack 