Monaco could have become unpredictable again. FIA said no

Formula 1 2026 is a construction site of constant experiments and adjustments: interventions, patches, fixes, U-turns, everything we feared even before the start of the biggest regulatory reset in the top category. While it is right to fix, with the necessary advance, what does not work, the constant interventionism by the FIA is inevitably generating controversy and pushing fans away, with many convinced that the changes are moving in favour of one team or another.

The decisions taken for Monaco come from the same place and raise the same doubts.

The Federation has in fact chosen to limit the deployment of the electric component and to not activate active aerodynamics in straight-line mode, a measure justified on safety grounds but one that risks depriving the Monte Carlo Grand Prix of one of the few variables truly capable of changing the show.

The technical reasoning is understandable. Monaco features a continuous sequence of slow corners, heavy braking zones and extremely short straights. In these conditions, the new 2026 single-seaters are able to recover large amounts of energy and deploy it immediately, almost exclusively on corner exit, generating particularly high acceleration peaks.

To prevent those levels of performance from turning into an excessive risk between the walls of the Principality, the FIA decided to intervene preventively.

Missed opportunity

A choice that, however, leaves one important question open: is this not a major missed opportunity to show the real potential of the cars born under this 50/50 combustion-electric regulation?

For years, Monaco has been criticised for its often locked-up Sunday races, shaped by the near impossibility of overtaking. Yet the 2026 regulations seemed capable of introducing a new and unpredictable element.

With a very high amount of electric energy available, with the various electric boosts and the differences in power management between drivers and teams, the risk of mistakes would have increased, but so would the possibility of seeing action on track. And this is where yet another criticism emerges.

Monaco is the drivers’ circuit. It is the track where talent should emerge more than anywhere else. Where sensitivity on the throttle, the ability to dose power and the courage to get close to the guardrails make the difference.

For once, Formula 1 could have put the drivers in front of a different challenge from the usual one: not managing a lack of performance, but an excess of performance.

In recent years, the category has progressively reduced the spaces in which the driver can truly make a difference. The cars have become increasingly sophisticated, predictable and controlled by systems.

Monaco itself could have represented a return to the origins, with single-seaters that were difficult to interpret and with an amount of energy capable of rewarding those who really have the best hands and feet.

It is clear that safety must remain an absolute priority. Nobody can ignore the risks of a narrow and fast street circuit like Monte Carlo.

However, the feeling is that once again the most conservative route possible has been chosen, intervening even before understanding what real effects the new regulations would have produced.

There is also another aspect that makes this decision even more debatable. For some time now, it has been said that overtaking in Monaco is impossible and that the result is decided almost entirely on Saturday. Yet Formula E, precisely thanks to differences in power and energy strategies, has shown much more dynamic races with far more position changes than usually happens in Formula 1.

Naturally, the two categories are profoundly different and cannot be directly compared. However, the principle remains valid: a significant difference in available power can create attacking opportunities even where, traditionally, they seem not to exist.

For this reason, the FIA’s decision appears to be a missed opportunity. Not because it is wrong to be concerned about safety, but because it chose to remove in advance one of the few regulatory novelties that could have restored unpredictability to one of the most iconic races on the calendar.

Monaco will probably continue to be a challenge of absolute precision. But it would have been fascinating to see the best drivers in the world face cars capable of truly putting them in difficulty, forcing them to manage an amount of power never seen before between the walls of the Principality.

After all, Formula 1 was born for this too: to put man in front of the machine and see who can tame it better than the others.