F1 2026 - Watchalong Thread

[Brazilianadventure]

Happy New Year.

This is going to be an interesting year with the regulation change.

Rumours are Mercedes and RB engines are exploiting a loophole and so may have the most powerful engines.

AM will have a car with significant input from Adrian Newey.

Sauber becomes Audi and we have an 11th team, Cadillac.

Christian Horner seems very keen to get back into F1, preferably Alpine with Flávio - they deserve each other.

There is closed door testing in Barcelona then open testing from 11 February at Sakhir.

Edited for typo and thread title.

Any suggestions of what to do with my school F1 fan club? Bizarrely I have more people this term and no actual races to talk about. We discussed the engine controversy last week.

@JamesWebbSpaceTelescope
There are only 35 world champions could you discuss one at a time? Focus on those that changed the sport e.g. Jackie Stewart would be good for safety, Michael Schumacher for exercise etc.

Other thoughts are:

• different roles at the race weekend e.g. Marshalls, medics, stewards, safety car etc.
• Unique champions e.g John Surtees (Bike & Car WC) , Graham Hill (Monaco, Indy 500, Le Mans)
• Could you show or ask them to watch the documentaries like Hill, Schumacher, Senna and discuss them. Hill & Schumacher are interesting as they give two different points of view.

There is also the schools challenge ?https://www.stemracing.co.uk and Missiin 44 https://mission44.org

HTH

Formula E ( today is its 150th race)

There is the Dakar Rally with Carlos Sainz SNR being completely mad,

@JamesWebbSpaceTelescope How about focusing on different circuits (both defunct and still in use)? Or Street circuits v track circuits? Different styles of circuit design, different features, and why drivers do/don't like them?

@JamesWebbSpaceTelescope How about Fantasy F1? It may be a little early u you could ask them to come up with the rules now. After testing they submit their teams.

Now that is a good idea. I’ll look into this.

The next 6 weeks are going to be torcherous

So, Adami is indeed out... well, not Hamilton's race engineer anyway. Hopefully he will gel with the next one 🤞

Definitely 🤞
I just hope the engine & car work well.

Very happy that Adami has been moved. I found some of his responses (or lack of!) to Lewis so unprofessional appalling.

I wish they could get Bono but that’s not going to happen so I’ll settle for a decent car. Not sure how realistic that is either though!

So happy that Lewis will have a different race engineer this year, it was painful to listen to last year. As much as I’d love him to win an 8th WDC, I’d settle for him getting on the podium at least once. I hate to see him so defeated.

Harry Styles next album is being released on 6th March, both DC will be counting down the minutes/hours/days to that weekend! 😄

I hope Lewis gets a better engineer this year, Adami was useless

What do we think of the new Red bull Livery and kit?

I like the retro white outline and shiny paintwork but the Ford blue on the top makes it look far too school PE kit for me.

@JamesWebbSpaceTelescope I like the blue on the car, it’s a brighter shade plus the glossy finish should look really good on track. I agree about the shirts.

I wonder with the lower weight limit if they will need to reduce the painted surface area.

Ds is 16 (verstappen fan) and loves the new livery. I also felt it was a bit retro but overall I liked it. I also find the bits I don't like become irrelevant after the first few races!
Ds would love the new shirt but at £95 he says he'll wait for the sale.

I really like the livery.
Not so keen on the colour of the kit, I prefer the darker blue, but I'm sure it will grow on me.

I like both the RB and the Red Bull livery. I'm not keen when the blue gets too dark, and I like less white on the RB. I'm not really into the merch generally but DS will be after a new shirt. The current one gets as much wear as his Newcastle shirt (which is a lot)

Two more car launches

Audi apparently have four colours chalk, titanium, graphite and lava red. It’s a like Mercedes with red instead of turquoise, particularly the uniform. The red on the car around and inside the air intake and side pods looks good.

Hass did a launch, all 1 minute 13 seconds of it.😂 I like the design it flows better it’s predominantly white with black writing and red accents.

I like Haas livery.

not much for the leaked McLaren team wear.

Agree it was very underwhelming (so far)
Oops realise I meant their merch!

Just seen a video from Ted saying from 9pm on Monday and every evening next week Sky will be showing testing highlights from Barcelona.

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1NMs39FUh3/?mibextid=wwXIfr

I thought Barcelona was behind closed doors so highlights is more Thani thought we would get.

It's being reported that Williams won't be taking part in Barcelona, I think because their car isnt ready