2026 brought the biggest rule change in Formula 1 for more than a decade, with new chassis and new power units at the same time. You don’t need to understand every detail to follow what happens in Baku, but a few changes explain almost everything.

The single most important number is the electric motor. The MGU-K, the motor-generator attached to the rear axle, now produces 350 kW, nearly three times the 120 kW of the previous generation. It drives the car on acceleration and recovers energy under braking. At the same time the MGU-H, which recovered energy from the turbo, has been removed. The result is a car that gets roughly half of its power from electricity but has fewer ways to recharge the battery. If you want a refresher on the combustion side, our guide to turbo vs naturally aspirated engines covers the basics.

For most tracks, that trade-off works. The car harvests energy under braking, spends it on the next straight, and the cycle repeats. Baku breaks that cycle, because it has one straight so long that the battery runs out before the car reaches the end.

The run from the final corner, through the start/finish line and all the way to Turn 1 is about 2.2 km of flat-out driving, the longest on the calendar. In the old cars, the engine did most of that work and the battery helped out. In 2026, the car relies on the battery for about half its power, and a battery can only give full power for so long before it runs low.

What is clipping?

When the battery can no longer supply full electric power, the power unit “clips”. Electric output drops, the combustion engine carries more of the load and the car’s acceleration falls away, even though the driver still has the throttle pressed to the floor. On the TV coverage you’ll see it as a car that stops gaining speed, or even starts losing it, well before the braking zone.

What is super clipping?

Super clipping goes a step further. The power unit deliberately takes some of the engine’s power to recharge the battery while the driver is still at full throttle. It feels completely wrong from the cockpit: foot flat down, and the car pulling less. But it means the battery arrives at the next part of the lap with some charge, rather than empty.

Drivers have been open about how strange it feels. “It’s super unnatural for us; we’ve never had that before ever until February this year,” Haas driver Oliver Bearman said before this weekend, describing the massive differences in power delivery around the lap. Pierre Gasly pointed out how little the driver controls: “We don’t have control of all of that side. It’s software, it’s whatever.”

Why this makes Baku harder

The energy has to come from somewhere, and every bit saved for the straight is energy not used to accelerate out of the slow corners. Get the balance wrong and a car either crawls out of the castle section or runs out of power halfway down the straight. That’s why Baku lap times depend so much on the software and energy strategy, not just the driver.

It also creates a safety issue in qualifying. A driver on a preparation lap, saving energy, can be travelling far more slowly than a driver on a push lap. “People opening the lap are very slow until the battery comes in… at 200 km/h, and people are coming at 350,” Fernando Alonso said. Audi’s Gabriel Bortoleto warned that it could be “a bit of a mess” and “dangerous if you are coming at 300 km/h”.

Until 2025, an F1 car’s wings were fixed apart from the DRS flap, which the driver could only open in specific zones when close to another car. In 2026, the front and rear wings move as a normal part of every lap. There are two settings:

Every driver, not just a car chasing another, can use Straight Mode in the designated zones. In Baku there are two: the main 2.2 km straight and the shorter run between Turns 2 and 3. The rest of the lap, including the old town, runs in Corner Mode. For a refresher on why wings create grip, see our explainer on what downforce is.

Why it’s harder in Baku

The switch at 330+ km/h. At the end of the main straight, the car goes from Straight Mode to Corner Mode just as the driver hits the brakes from top speed. The balance of the car changes in an instant, with downforce returning at the same moment the tyres are asked for maximum grip. Any difference between front and rear, even a small one, can make the car unstable in the one braking zone at Baku where everyone is trying to overtake.

The wind. Baku’s name is often linked with the wind, and gusts of around 39 km/h were forecast for qualifying. Wind changes how much drag and downforce a car makes, and a low-downforce car is especially sensitive to it. Franco Colapinto described the gusts as “so inconsistent that it would be very difficult for us”. It even played a part in the biggest story of qualifying: championship leader Kimi Antonelli said a stronger headwind gave his car “a lot more” front grip than on the previous lap, so it turned in more than he expected and he clipped the wall at Turn 1.

Low downforce everywhere. Even in Corner Mode, teams choose a relatively low-downforce setup to be quick on the straight. That leaves less grip for the old town, where the walls punish the smallest slide. The 2026 cars’ narrower tyres also give slightly less mechanical grip to fall back on.

DRS is gone. In its place is overtake mode, which works on a similar principle but gives the chasing car more energy instead of less drag. If a car is within one second of the car in front at a designated detection point, it gets extra electrical energy to use on the next lap. It can also recharge more: overtake mode allows an additional 0.5 MJ of harvesting, which is why the FIA’s Baku limit rises from 8.5 MJ to 9 MJ per lap for a car using it.

Drivers also have a boost button they control themselves. Whenever they want, whether attacking or defending, they can use the energy they’ve harvested, all at once or spread over the lap. So a defending driver isn’t helpless: he can spend his own boost to fight back, as long as he has the energy to do it.

Why Baku is the biggest test of the boost

On most tracks, a boost helps a driver close the gap on a straight of a few hundred metres. In Baku, the chasing car has 2.2 km to use its extra energy, while the leading car may already be clipping. That’s the scenario analysts have highlighted before this weekend: a driver who reaches the straight with more energy stored can close very quickly on a rival whose battery is already running low.

But it cuts both ways. Using energy to attack in one lap means less for the next one, and the battery doesn’t refill the way a fuel tank would. A driver who spends everything to get alongside into Turn 1 and then fails to complete the move can be left exposed on the next straight. Deciding when to push the button, and when not to, is a new skill in 2026, and Baku rewards it more than most. Our explainer on the slipstream covers the other half of the equation: the tow still works exactly as it always has.

Brembo, which supplies brakes to most of the grid, rates Baku 4 out of 5 for braking difficulty. Its circuit data shows why:

Brembo’s figures come from its circuit guide and reflect cars before 2026. The 2026 cars are lighter and run different speeds, but the pattern is the same: a huge stop from top speed into Turn 1, followed by repeated heavy braking into the 90-degree corners of the first sector. To put 5g in context, see our comparison of g-force in F1 and in a fighter jet.

What 2026 changes for the brakes

F1 brakes use carbon-carbon discs, which only work well within a certain temperature window. Too cold and they don’t grip properly; too hot and they wear fast. Baku is a problem because the discs cool down on the 2.2 km straight, then have to stop the car from top speed at Turn 1. The tyres cool too, which is why F1’s own preview flags the risk of locking up there.

2026 adds another layer. With the MGU-K now three times more powerful, much more of the rear braking is done by the electric motor recovering energy, not by the friction brakes. Brembo says rear braking systems can be up to 20% smaller as a result, while the fronts need roughly 5% more capacity. The rule makers also raised the maximum front disc diameter by 15 mm. Rear brakes still have to be able to stop the car on their own if the power unit fails: the rules require at least 2,500 Nm of braking torque per rear wheel without any help from the MGU-K.

That’s a big change in how the brakes work, and it creates a new challenge. Brembo’s Andrea Algeri called the 2026 changes “one of the most challenging” regulation shifts his team has faced, explaining that a circuit’s braking severity “now is more related to energy recovery”. In practice, the car’s brake-by-wire system has to blend friction braking and electric recovery perfectly, every time, and the mix changes with how full the battery is. If the balance shifts from one braking zone to the next, the driver feels a different car into each corner. At Turn 1 in Baku, where every driver is braking from top speed at the limit, that’s the last thing anyone needs. Our guide to how race car brake systems work explains the basics.

Put the pieces together and the 2026 Azerbaijan Grand Prix is a race of energy management as much as outright speed. Here’s what the technical challenges mean for how the race plays out, based on F1’s and Pirelli’s pre-race data:

Four things to watch on TV

1. Speed at the end of the straight. If a car starts dropping back before the braking zone, it’s probably clipping. Compare it with the car behind. A sudden gain is usually overtake mode or boost.

2. Lock-ups into Turn 1. Cold tyres and brakes after 2.2 km of straight, plus a car switching from Straight Mode to Corner Mode, make Turn 1 the most likely place for a mistake. A puff of tyre smoke is the giveaway.

3. Defending on the straight. A leader who saves energy in the old town can defend with his own boost on the straight. Watch whether the leading driver can hold off a car that’s within a second.

4. Safety car restarts. After a safety car, everyone’s battery and brake temperatures reset at the same moment. The restart down the long straight can shuffle the order in seconds.