Racing
© Jonathan Borba
Nigel Mansell has attacked Formula 1’s 2026 rules as both distorting overtakes and creating a serious safety risk, saying some passes are “completely fake” because battery deployment is being dictated by the car rather than the driver.
Speaking to Autosport, the 1992 world champion said the issue was not simply that the racing can look unnatural, but that drivers are no longer fully deciding when the extra performance arrives. “I might get shot for saying this, but unfortunately some overtakes are completely fake,” Mansell said. He added that some moves initially look impressive, only for the order to swing back on corner exit because “the computer is delivering extra power at the wrong time” and “the driver isn’t controlling it.”
Mansell said that loss of control is what makes the current style of racing so troubling. In his view, a driver can be pulled into an overtake they would not have chosen, then immediately become vulnerable when the energy swings the other way. “If I could choose, I wouldn’t have used it there,” he said.
He linked that directly to safety, pointing to the heavy crash involving Oliver Bearman after the Haas driver closed rapidly on Franco Colapinto’s slow Alpine at the Japanese Grand Prix. “I do sympathise with the drivers enormously. I think it’s very dangerous at the moment, and we got away with one terrible accident in Japan already, so that was luck,” Mansell said. “He could he been hurt really badly, Oliver.”
That criticism is also a direct rebuttal to Stefano Domenicali’s defense of the current regulations. The Formula 1 president and CEO had told Autosport that complaints about artificial overtaking were overblown, saying “an overtake is an overtake” and arguing that fans “have a short memory” because fuel and pace management also existed in the 1980s turbo era.
Mansell rejected that comparison outright. He said the lift-and-coast of his era was a driver-led technique, not a software-managed energy event. “No, no we didn’t,” he said. “If we lifted and coasted, it was like feathering the throttle when you’re slipstreaming somebody and deciding not to overtake them. That’s saving fuel and feathering. That’s smart.”
For Mansell, the key difference is that modern cars can have their running shaped by systems harvesting and releasing energy for the battery. “Having to have a computer just take over the running of the car and harvest for the battery, that’s something completely different,” he said. “And we didn’t slow down by 50 to 70ks going into the fastest corners. It’s a bit of a stretch to compare that, I have to say.”
His comments come as F1 introduces changes for this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix aimed at reducing superclipping, allowing more flat-out driving in qualifying and improving safety at the start and in wet conditions. But with battery recovery and software-led power distribution still central to the 2026 package, Mansell’s argument goes beyond aesthetics and cuts to whether the new rules are producing the kind of racing, and the level of risk, the series can accept.