F1 has become WWE and it may be your fault

Lewis Hamilton holds a WWE world title to the backdrop of an F1 race — Photo: © IMAGO

F1 2026

F1 has become WWE and it may be your fault

F1's racing is much better but is it still F1?

Dan Ripley Global Editor

Professional F1 journalist and analyst

Tuesday 17 March 2026 12:55

Formula 1 has a bit of a problem in that it seems so many of its fans now hate the sport.

Now that can sometimes be swept under the rug, or be ignored to let fans keep screaming about why they hate the sport until they run out of energy.

I like to call this the Homer Simpson boxing tactic, in how it relies on taking seemingly endless punches until the attacker is tired and you just simply push over their weak shell left.

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Just to provide context, fans, and to be fair many drivers including Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso hate this new style of racing that even very few 'petrolheads' understand.

The concept of drivers having to purposefully slow down to charge their battery for use of more speed and overtaking opportunities later on is as confusing as it is artificial in holding a motor race.

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F1's racing has got BETTER this year

Yet the real interesting thing to this year is the positive trade-off in that F1 races have been rather good. Granted, it's a small sample size of two, but the Australian and Chinese grands prix were an enjoyable show in the context of what F1 is these days.

Both featured drivers going back and forth for position, meaning that even when an overtake was completed, there was a reasonable chance the overtaken driver could fight back and reclaim the place rather than be dropped and escaped, which was a common occurrence in the last few decades of F1 at least.

In fact this is the style of racing you would usually see to some extent in MotoGP, albeit more naturally. It's not outrageous to say this nature of motorbike racing makes a much more exciting spectacle than car racing.

F1 now has a good racing product, but is it a good F1 motor racing product? Turns out if you think the sport has become garbage this year yet clapped along like a seal for the previous 15+ years at some of the slop F1 has offered to you, then you may be part of the problem.

Now I get it, the new cars are a bit of a gimmick and are difficult to understand. Is having to slow down batteries to charge them really in the spirit of F1? Not really.

F1 has not been F1 for years

But I ask you this. Was introducing a standardised boost button in 2009 and then again in 2011 to aid overtaking in the spirit of F1? How about a DRS flap to stall the rear wing on a certain section of track a certain distance behind a driver? Not really.

How about deciding to destroy the sound of F1 by ditching V10s or even V8 engines in 2014 to replace them with naff turbo hybrids that had about as much F1 spirit as a Toyota Prius? Certainly not.

If you think this doesn't matter, listen to this Juan Pablo Montoya lap from qualifying at the 2004 Italian Grand Prix, then tell me with a straight face how what we have today, such as Kimi Antonelli's pole lap in China, is anywhere near as good.

Maybe these didn't affect having to purposefully slow cars down during a race like the new style of driving requires, but F1 has always had an element of this anyway. Driving to conserve fuel, to conserve tyres. Lift and coast isn't a new thing by the way.

F1 long ago started the slide from being a 'sport' to trudging over to 'sports entertainment,' to borrow a professional wrestling term from former WWE owner Vince McMahon. The difference between the two is that entertainment is prioritised over the sport itself. Forget the traditions or what F1 is all about, it's about getting in as many fans as possible by creating the most drama in anyway possible.

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This of course has all accelerated under Liberty Media since they took control in 2017. Today in F1 we have documentaries creating false rivalries, F1 drivers relying on Duracell bunnies, F1 races commissioned on attracting celebrities who don't know what a chequered flag is and race tracks with drain covers acting like Mario Kart weapons.

These issues didn't appear overnight. Unless you want F1 to return to cars similar to the 1990s and 2000s, you simply can only blame yourself if you hate F1 now but welcomed everything that's infected the sport over the last 15 years. You've already accepted sports entertainment, and its now time to accept your improved version of it.

Until you see the error in your ways, I'll be in the 1990s F1 highlights lobby, with V10s and Murray Walker helping drown out the performative noise while F1 sits back and waits to give you all another Homer Simpson push.

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Written by

Dan Ripley - Global Editor

I've been a massive F1 fan since the mid 1990s and continue to study the history of the sport long before that. As an experienced motor sport reporter covering F1, MotoGP and the LeMans 24 Hour race, being part of GPFans has allowed me to work with a diverse team with all sorts of different backgrounds in watching the sport and given me a greater appreciation of F1.

View full biography