Gasly tells F1 fans: Australian GP start will be ‘one to remember’

Alpine’s Pierre Gasly says F1 fans all over the world won’t want to miss the start of next month’s Australian Grand Prix, a moment that may deliver a level of chaos rarely seen in the sport’s modern history.

Formula 1’s 2026 technical reset has arrived like a lightning bolt, stripping away the familiar comforts of the previous generation. Gone is the MGU-H element, the silent partner that once kept turbos spinning with digital precision.

In its place is a raw, mechanical action where drivers must wring their engines to life just to crawl off the line, creating a high-stakes theater of revs and reliability.

What was once a finely tuned ritual – engines revving, clutches biting, tyres gripping – now feels more like a gamble. Drivers are discovering that even a minor miscalculation can snowball into a disastrous getaway before they’ve travelled a single car length.

A Perfect Storm on the Grid

The roots of the looming unpredictability are mechanical as much as they are human. The removal of the MGU-H from the new power units has shifted responsibility for turbo preparation onto the internal combustion engine, forcing drivers to hold higher revs for longer before launch.

That delicate balancing act increases the risk of bogged starts, slow reactions or even anti-stall triggers – all while 22 cars sit nose-to-tail waiting for the lights to extinguish.

On the aerodynamic front, concerns are equally sharp. Oscar Piastri summed up the potential Turn 1 scenario in blunt terms: “A pack of 22 cars with a couple hundred points less downforce sounds like a recipe for disaster to me,” argued the McLaren charger.

Gasly, meanwhile, has chosen intrigue over alarmism but has still issued a clear warning: “I advise you to be sitting with your TV on in Australia, because it could be one that everybody remembers.

“We'll find out, I'm not too sure myself. But yeah, it is definitely going to be more tricky than it used to be.”

While confident that teams will eventually solve the puzzle, Gasly doubts everything will be perfected by round one: “But as it stands now, after only two weeks of testing, we can see that it's not going to be easy in Australia,” he insisted.

• Read also: Gasly warns F1 drivers risk becoming ‘passengers’ under new rules

And beyond the launch itself lies an even broader worry – simply reaching the chequered flag.

“But that's part of the list, among a lot of other situations, which might not be easy,” the 30-year-old added.

“That's why I think in Australia, reliability and getting to the end of the race [are] going to be challenge number one and priority number one.

“And as simple as it sounds, because it's not something we would have said in the past with the previous cars, these cars are extremely complex.”

Backmarkers, Bottlenecks and Brutal Consequences

If the front rows fear losing metres, those further back may risk losing entire races before Turn 1. Drivers at the tail end of the grid often have less time to complete their start procedures — a disadvantage that new regulations could magnify dramatically.

Esteban Ocon acknowledged the concern but argued against altering the format.

“I think it would be nice if they kept it the same,” said the Haas driver, quoted by Motorsport.com.

“We are obviously working on that with the team. It's clear that the turbo lag is a very big topic, but we have to adapt to what the rules are, and it would not be nice I think for the top three to wait like 1m30s until the cars are stopped, and have cold tyres into Turn 1.

“I think you are going to see a lot more struggling of starts and a lot more differences compared to how the years before were, where the worst start was losing one or two positions on the grid – now you could lose the whole lot,” the Frenchman added, echoing Oscar Piastri’s opinion on the matter.

“So, we are improving step by step. It's still early days and unfortunately [Bahrain] is not the best track to do starts as well, because the grip is very low, so that helps the engine.

• Read also: Piastri warns: Botched F1 starts could cost ‘six or seven spots’

“But, yeah, it's interesting. It's not like the old rally cars or the old cars with simple turbos where you can get it up to spin quite easily. What we do as drivers doesn't have much of an input on that. It's very strange. But, I think it's the same for all of us.”

In a championship defined by milliseconds, the 2026 curtain-raiser threatens to redefine the first five seconds altogether.

Melbourne’s launch may not just set the tone for the race – it could set the tone for an entire era, where anticipation, not certainty, greets the extinguishing of the lights.

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