Newey: FIA fell under the influence of two car manufacturers

Last Thursday, the FIA ​​​​published the main provisions of the new technical regulations, which will come into force in 2026. Adrian Newey, the most famous and successful racing car designer in the history of Formula 1, was of course not present at this event and commented on it in his own way in an interview with British MotorSport Magazine.

Last month it was officially announced that Newey will end his long-term partnership with Red Bull at the end of this year and he has not yet decided on any further plans, although there is a lot of talk in the paddock that he has already received offers from several teams, most notably Ferrari and Mercedes, but also Aston Martin and Williams are mentioned in this context.

But if Newey decides to continue his career in Formula 1, in the next phase he will only have to deal with these technical regulations, which he did not seem to particularly like.

“We know the basic principles of what the FIA ​​is trying to achieve, and initially this is the desire to ensure that the power of the power plant is equally distributed between the combustion engine and the electric part of it,” Newey recalls. – Whether this is a good development direction or not, I will not comment better on it.

Everyone wants to make cars a little lighter, but the reality is that the power plant is quite heavy, so weight reduction can only be achieved within small limits. There is also a desire to make cars more aerodynamically efficient, which I fully agree with and support.

Unfortunately, motorsport in general suffers from the same problem: it all ends with us having to work with regulations that set a very strict framework and are prescriptive in nature. I would like the rules to be more open. Motorsport generally aims for zero emissions, but I believe this is wrong if the objectives are not formulated specifically enough and are constantly changing.

I prefer a different approach: if we want a car to cause less damage to the ecology of the planet, we need to develop a fairly wide range of problems that need to be solved, and move in that direction. And don’t set a course to reduce tailpipe emissions to zero, as this essentially means switching to electricity or hydrogen.

At the same time, neither one nor the other technology has yet reached the level we expect when we talk about racing at Formula 1 level.”

Furthermore, Newey openly criticized the FIA ​​and accused the federation of being influenced by individual championship teams: “It seems that the FIA ​​has come under the powerful influence of one or two car manufacturers in the hope of appeasing them, but perhaps also attract the attention of others.

I think there will be some success if Audi enters Formula 1 in 2026, but I’m not sure it will be worth it as the end result will be quite a compromise. In reality, car manufacturers come and go, with Ferrari being the only exception.

However, the basis of Formula 1 activities are the teams, and of course everything depends on a fundamental factor such as the interest of the fans. Therefore, the most important thing is to provide a quality spectacle, and as we know this can be achieved if the championship is characterized by diversity.”