While the Mexican Grand Prix offered a rare mix of strategies, many of the recent races have followed a familiar pattern. George Russell described F1 as a race to Turn 1, with dirty air becoming more of a factor again and teams favouring the most conservative strategy – the one-stop.
This year’s Pirelli tyres are more robust than in previous seasons, allowing drivers to push more, but also reducing tyre degradation. It has removed some key strategic variables for teams.
“I think Pirelli gets a hard time no matter what,” Russell said when asked by Motorsport.com. “If there’s lots of tyre degradation, people say it’s not real and drivers can’t push. When there’s no tyre degradation, we say it’s a boring race.
“So realistically, you want a tyre that you can push full gas, but that doesn’t go the whole race. If you could choose, you’d want a tyre that you can go flat out on, but after 15 laps it falls off a cliff.”
The last five races have all been won with a one-stop strategy. If changing weather conditions in Silverstone and a late safety car in Zandvoort are excluded, the last race won on a two-stopper was the Austrian Grand Prix.
Previous attempts to encourage two-stop races have fallen flat
Pirelli has experimented with softer tyres compared to last year, and skipping compounds in its tyre allocation – such as bringing the C1, C3 and C4 instead of three consecutive compounds.
In both cases, teams still made a one-stop work strategy by managing the tyres more. It was the case in Austin as well, where everyone except Alex Albon completed the race with just a single pitstop, despite Pirelli’s step in compounds.
Alexander Albon was a rare two-stopper in Austin
Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images
“Teams always maximise what they have, and that means they try to reduce the number of pitstops,” Pirelli’s motorsport manager, Mario Isola, said. “It makes sense because during a pitstop you can make a mistake and when you go back on track, you can get in traffic and lose additional time.
“Teams always try to minimise the number of pitstops because they don’t care about the show.”
To potentially improve that “show”, some in the paddock have suggested mandating two pitstops by regulations. It’s exactly what Max Verstappen said in Baku – arguing that forcing two stops is still better than bringing a tyre (C6) that in his view is “useless”.
“What we are doing is try to make something good for the show,” Isola told Motorsport.com. “And I believe that a two-stop is better for the show because you have more unpredictability. But you can’t force anyone unless we accept that two pitstops are defined by regulation.”
Mandating two pitstops may still not be enough
The discussion has gained some momentum in recent weeks and came up during the Mexico GP drivers’ briefing. According to the FIA, the topic was on the agenda for this week’s Sporting Advisory Committee (SAC) and Motorsport.com understands it will be discussed in the F1 Commission as well.
The FIA stresses that ideas are far from concrete yet, although several teams – and Liberty Media – would at least be willing to explore the options for next year.
“Yes, we spoke about this several times,” said Isola. “I remember that last time we had some simulations from the teams. We had a chat with the other stakeholders, with the FIA, F1, and the teams, and said, okay, if we select these three compounds for event A, B, C, D, E, what is the predicted strategy for you? We asked the teams to make those simulations and come back to us – not making this public, but only providing the information to us.
“What we realised is that the majority of the teams were converging on the same strategy, because you have a soft that is able to run five laps, a medium that is good for 20 laps, and a hard that can go longer. They were basically replicating the same strategy. So, when you put more constraints, the risk is that everyone is going in the same direction.”
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, Mario Isola, Director of Pirelli F1
Photo by: Reginald Mathalone / NurPhoto via Getty Images
More pitstops would create more undercut opportunities, but not necessarily more variety.
“The best races are the ones in which the two-stop has an advantage, but someone brave can still try a different strategy,” Isola added. “We had a good example of that in Monza last year, when Charles [Leclerc] was able to win on one stop and others were on two stops. It was like that in Spa with George as well, but unfortunately, this doesn’t happen every time.”
Two stops without compound restriction a better option?
If F1 decides to move towards two mandatory pitstops in the future, multiple options are on the table. One possible direction would be the two-stop requirement but remove the mandate to use different compounds.
“We can also consider two stops without any obligation to use different compounds, so then they can use whatever they want,” Isola explained.
“You can do medium, medium, medium if you have the tyres. If you are at the back, you probably want to start on the hards because you want to go longer at the beginning of the race. If you are in the middle of the grid, maybe you want to start on the softs and get rid of some traffic. There are many combinations.”
This, Isola suggests, would create more strategic variety – something the compound rule might prevent even with two stops. However, he emphasised that such plans would still need more research if it’s something the FIA, F1, and teams really want to pursue.
Tyres in the McLaren garage
Photo by: Steven Tee / LAT Images via Getty Images
“My personal suggestion – it’s not me making the regulations, so I can just talk from my experience and what I have seen in 15 years – is that if there is a common agreement or idea for the future, that we identify a number of races and ask the teams to simulate,” Isola said. “If we choose this, what’s your reaction? Then we’ll see if they come back with different approaches. And if they do, that’s probably the way to go.”
“Don’t risk to damage what we have now”
However, there are two considerations as F1 prepares for the 2026 season. First, the experiment with two mandatory stops hasn’t been a great success in Monaco, although Isola responds: “We shouldn’t take Monaco as an example, because there you had the risk of going off-road,” he referred to drivers cutting the Nouvelle Chicane.
Those in favour are more inclined to look at the 2023 Qatar Grand Prix, in which two stops were mandatory for safety reasons. In combination with the extreme heat, it caused physical problems for some drivers, but the idea of drivers pushing without tyre management is appealing to Liberty Media.
The second question is whether changes are needed at all if the new cars can follow more closely in 2026. Dirty air should be less of a factor under F1’s new rule set, which could make any intervention premature.
“Maybe, but I don’t know,” Isola said. “In general, if we want to consider a regulation change, we should work together to avoid unexpected consequences.
“Next year, as you said, is all different. We don’t know what to expect, but when we have an idea, there’s at least a possibility to react. But we should consider that we have a good championship now, so don’t take the risk to damage what we have.”
A potential two-stop rule will be discussed further in upcoming meetings – with all parties asked to remain open-minded at this early stage.
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