F1 slammed as 'PATHETIC' after fans shut out

F1 News & Gossip

F1 slammed as 'PATHETIC' after fans shut out

F1's first testing event takes place behind closed doors

Sam Cook Digital Journalist

Sports Journalist who has been covering motorsport since 2023

Tuesday 13 January 2026 08:58

Former F1 general manager Peter Windsor has said that F1 are missing a huge opportunity ahead of the new season, describing a pre-season event as 'pathetic'.

With a regulations reset hitting F1 in 2026, there are a whopping 11 days of testing available to teams before they head out for the competitive 2026 action at the Australian Grand Prix at the start of March.

Five days of the F1 testing take place in Barcelona in late January, before there are two three-day testing events penned in for Bahrain in February, as teams look to iron out any problem they may encounter in the early days of the rule changes.

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But the five days of testing in Barcelona are set to be privately conducted, away from the eyes of F1 fans, in the first shakedown for the new 2026 cars.

Now, Windsor has called the decision not to open up the testing event to fans 'pathetic', stating that the sport could attract so many fans to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya even just for a testing event.

"It's a perfect opportunity to really sell F1 before the season starts," Windsor said on the Cameron CC YouTube channel.

"And yet the teams I presume have said oh no we can't do that, it's just pathetic and I have no sympathies for anything that they come up with later in the year if they have complaints about something because it's totally wrong.

"The fans should have access to the test and they should all be there. It's not as if it's a Fiorano test or some sort of Silverstone shakedown, it's a proper test.

"It's a Formula 1 test and it's a great thing. And they should start having those hot laps at tests too and Pirelli should be allowed to do those hot laps at tests, there should be 50,000, 60,000 people at every day of the test.

"That's what testing should be all about, and they're missing a massive opportunity in not doing that. The only word I can think of is pathetic."

When are the 2026 F1 car launches?

F1 fans are getting excited about the reveal of the new cars, with Audi being the first team to take theirs out on track last week.

But it will be Red Bull and Racing Bulls who will be the first teams to officially unveil their car, with a joint season launch event in Detroit on January 15.

Here are all of the teams' car unveiling dates and how to watch the events.

When are the F1 2026 car launches?
Team	Location	Date	How to watch
Red Bull	Detroit, USA	January 15	Red Bull Racing website, YouTube
Racing Bulls	Detroit, USA	January 15	Red Bull Racing website, YouTube
Haas	Online	January 19	Haas F1 website and social pages
Audi	Berlin, Germany	January 20	YouTube, Audi social channels
Ferrari	Maranello, Italy	January 23	YouTube, Ferrari social media pages
Alpine	Barcelona, Spain	January 23	YouTube, Alpine social media pages
Mercedes	Online	February 2	Mercedes social channels
Williams	TBC	February 3	TBC
Cadillac	Santa Clara, USA	February 8	Cadillac F1 website, YouTube
Aston Martin	TBC	February 9	TBC
McLaren	TBC	February 9	TBC

Written by

Sam Cook - Digital Journalist

Sam Cook is a talented young sports journalist and social media professional who now specialises in Formula 1, having previously worked as a football journalist and a local news reporter for a variety of different brands.

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F1 2026 regulations pre-season testing