Toto Wolff ‘convinced’ F1 2026 ‘too slow’ fears won’t become reality

Toto Wolff says he’s sure the intellect and ingenuity of F1’s engineers will overcome the obstacle to speed that the new F1 2026 rules currently represent.

Formula 1 tears up its rulebooks for the 2026 season, with revolutionary engine and chassis regulations incoming that will present a whole new engineering challenge for the teams to overcome.

Toto Wolff: With current regulations, the speed would be too low

A crucial factor for the F1 2026 regulations is that the chassis rules have been made long after the engine regulations, with the primary focus of the new rules being to introduce a very different power unit for the first time since the introduction of the hybrid engines in 2014.

While retaining a 1.6-litre V6 with hybrid ancillaries, the ratio of power generated by the internal combustion engine relative to electrical output has been shifted to a 50/50 split. Along with a switch to fully sustainable fuels, the power unit rule changes have attracted the likes of Audi and Honda to commit as engine manufacturers, with Red Bull Powertrains also joining alongside existing manufacturers Ferrari, Mercedes, and Renault.

But the new engines simply plonked into the back of a car built to the 2024/’25 regulations would result in a significant dip in laptime, meaning the chassis rules have also needed significant work.

To that end, the 2026 cars will have a huge focus on reducing aerodynamic drag with active aerodynamics for the front and rear wings incoming in order to ensure the new power units are able to deploy and harvest energy effectively.

Last year, Red Bull boss Christian Horner revealed his fears that F1 was set to race with ‘Frankenstein cars’ and, while those fears have dissipated somewhat as the regulations have become reality, concerns over their complexity and the likelihood of any given team nailing the new regulations to dominate for the first years of the new cycle have not.

As for the performance aspect, the FIA’s Nikolas Tombazis believes F1 2026 will only be a little slower than the current regulations, and Mercedes’ boss Toto Wolff has weighed in on what he believes will happen.

Speaking to Austrian broadcaster ORF and quoted by the German subsidiary of Motorsport.com, Wolff said using the current chassis with the new engines would simply be far too slow: “If you were to implement the current regulations, the speed would definitely be too low.”

The introduction of “a very advanced engine concept”, means the revolutionary chassis regulations are required “so that we don’t run out of power, so to speak, we have to have cars that have as little drag as possible on the straights, but still have enough downforce in corners to be fast.”

But Wolff has revealed current simulations being carried out by Mercedes suggest the laptimes could take a significant step backward when the new rules are introduced.

“What we have at the moment is simply far too slow,” he said.

“We sometimes have lap times that are up to ten seconds slower.”

Despite this, Wolff is convinced the deficit in laptime will be quickly made up for once it becomes the sole focus of every engineer at every team.

“Formula 1 has always been an innovation incubator, and I am convinced that with what the engineers will come up with and, with the [chassis] regulations, which we still have to change, the cars will definitely become fast again,” he said.

“It’s still much faster than anything else out there, and you have to leave the church in the church: There is no difference for the television viewer. IndyCars look fast, but they are 20 seconds slower.”

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Given that the focus of the new regulations has been on introducing more efficient and powerful power units with greater emphasis on electrification – something which is of increased road relevance for the six confirmed power unit manufacturers in 2026 – Tombazis recently explained why it isn’t possible to continue using the existing chassis regulations when the new power units are rolled out.

“That wouldn’t be a very good idea because, as much as the maximum power has gone up, because a lot of it is electrical, that cannot last for so long,” Tombazis – who has overseen the new rulebook’s development – told Tom Clarkson on the Beyond the Grid podcast.

“Therefore, towards the end of the straights, we need to have cars with lower drag, lower aerodynamic drag, which is what these technical regulations have done.

“The current generation cars have a bit too high a drag and, therefore, would suffer some velocity drop off towards the end of the straights.

“We believe we’ve solved this problem for the new cars.”

With the F1 2026 regulations putting the cart before the horse by forcing the design of the car to work around the engine, leading to such complex regulations, Wolff admitted a different ratio on the power generation side might have alleviated some headaches – particularly as the sport will be running with fully sustainable fuels anyway.

“Perhaps we would have done a little less battery and more combustion engine, because we are running 100% biofuel anyway,” he said.

“It’s 100 percent sustainable. So something could have been adapted. But that ship has sailed.”

But, with the regulations now locked in and having attracted some new names to join as power unit manufacturers, F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali told Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport a different concept entirely could have been the outcome.

“You always have to keep an eye on the political climate at the time,” he said. “There were times when people demanded total electrification from us.”

While the new regulations are certainly on the complex side, a compensating factor to attempt to improve the show will see the chassis become smaller – it will be shorter, narrower, and around 30 kilogrammes lighter than the current generation, utilising the active aerodynamics in a bid to compensate for a loss of cornering ability due to reduced downforce, as well as slower top-end speeds.

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