Oliver Bearman‘s massive crash at Spoon Curve during the Japanese Grand Prix didn’t come as much of a surprise to anyone following Formula 1 for the past months. That is the most damning thing about it.
The drivers, and some team bosses like McLaren’s Andrea Stella, had been vocal about the closing speed problem since before the start of the season.
The Grand Prix Drivers’ Association (GPDA) had raised it, and individual drivers had described it in worrying terms more than once.
“We’ve been warning them about this happening, this kind of closing speeds and this kind of accidents were always going to happen,” Carlos Sainz said of Bearman’s accident.
“I’m not very happy with what we’ve had up until now. Hopefully we come up with a better solution that doesn’t create these massive closing speeds and a safer way of going racing.”
In what now looks like a misreading of the dangers of the current rules, no action had been taken other than to tweak the energy recovery allowance in qualifying to reduce the lift-and-coast and super-clipping.
Then, on lap 20 of the Japanese GP, Bearman hit the wall at 50g, fortunately escaping with just bruising.
The mechanics of the incident are not very complicated.
The 2026 power units require unusual driving techniques to keep the batteries topped up for energy deployment, and when a car transitions into a harvesting phase, the loss of electrical output causes it to slow dramatically.
At Suzuka, Franco Colapinto was in that harvesting phase approaching Spoon, while Bearman behind him was in deployment mode. The speed differential was around 50km/h (30mph), and it caught Bearman completely off guard.
The Haas driver turned left to avoid the Alpine, went off the track and lost control at high speed.
Bearman himself described it as a “massive overspeed” and said the closing speed was “a part of these new regulations that I guess we have to get used to.”
The high closing speed contributed directly to the severity of the impact, as Bearman ended up hitting the barriers with huge force.
The reaction from drivers after the race had a certain quality of vindication.
Sainz, as GPDA director, said: “There were a lot of big moments there in the first three laps while we were all sorting out our energies until our systems learned with the closing speeds we have with the boost button.
“Even without using the boost button, sometimes your engine gives you a lot more speed than the guy in front, depending on where the other is on the energy. It was only a matter of time the first big crash was going to happen.”
Drivers like Sainz had already warned about a crash like Bearman’s
Grand Prix Photo
In a separate Sky F1 interview, Sainz did not hold back. “I was so surprised when they said ‘we will sort out qualifying and leave the racing alone because it’s exciting.’
“As drivers, we have been extremely vocal that the problem is not only qualifying, but also racing. We have been warning this kind of accident will always happen.”
Lando Norris had put it in equally visceral terms earlier in the season.
“You can have a 30-40-50km/h speed differential. When someone hits someone at that speed, you’re going to fly, you’re going to go over the fence and you’re going to do a lot of damage to yourself and maybe to others. That’s a pretty horrible thing to think about.”
Andrea Stella had also been direct when analysing the crash.
“It’s not a surprise,” added Stella. “We said that already in testing. It is in the agenda of the FIA in terms of the aspects of this 2026 regulations that should be improved. We don’t want to wait for things to happen to put actions in place so something happened.”
Something has now happened, and so action will have to be taken before Formula 1 reaches circuits where the situation could take a far uglier turn.
Suzuka has run-off at Spoon, and Sainz made the point directly: “Here, we were lucky there was an escape road. Imagine going to Baku or Singapore, or Las Vegas and having these kinds of closing speeds.”
Baku, with its kilometre-long flat-out blast down the main straight surrounded by concrete walls, is one of the fastest and most unforgiving circuits Formula 1 visits.
Bearman’s crash will inevitably lead to action
Grand Prix Photo
The energy differential that sent Bearman spinning across Suzuka’s generous asphalt could, at Baku, produce an incident with far bigger consequences.
Singapore and Las Vegas, both street circuits with similarly confined run-off, will present the same risk.
The FIA is usually quick to react once accidents happen, and changes will be made before the next race in Miami.
The question is what those changes will look like.
No simple solutions
The options on the table are broadly three.
The first is to increase the power of the energy recovery, which would allow drivers to recharge their cars’ batteries more quickly and reduce the duration of the harvesting phases that create the speed differentials.
However, this carries a paradox: if one driver has finished harvesting and moved back into deployment while another is still in the harvesting phase, the closing speed differential in that transitional moment could actually be worse, not better. It also risks widening the gap between manufacturers if someone has built their power unit around a lower recovery philosophy.
The second possible solution is to reduce the deployable power, which would lower the peak speeds at which cars close on rivals. It is technically the cleanest of the three levers, but it does not address the underlying problem. A car decelerating sharply through a harvesting phase while being caught by one still in deployment remains a dangerous situation; it would just be happening at marginally lower speeds.
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The third option — raising the fuel flow limit — is perhaps the least direct lever of all. The logic is that a higher internal combustion engine contribution, instead of the current 50/50, means teams need less electrical deployment to hit competitive lap times, and would therefore run smaller harvest-deploy cycles by choice.
But the harvesting requirement itself is set by the energy regulations, not the fuel flow limit, so any relief would be an indirect consequence rather than a targeted fix.
It also risks opening Pandora’s box in two other directions: it partially undoes the sustainability rationale behind regulations that were sold as a step toward greener motor sport, and it could alter the competitive picture mid-season by disadvantaging manufacturers who have optimised around electrical power.
Which is why the FIA said after Bearman’s accident that “any potential adjustments, particularly those related to energy management, require careful simulation and detailed analysis” — and why the drivers, who have been warning about this for months, will be watching the April 9 F1 Commission meeting very closely indeed.
While those are the main options, they don’t exhaust the possibilities, as more left-field solutions could also be implemented.
Aside from a potential in-car warning system showing the energy state of the car directly ahead, one of the simplest solutions would be setting mandatory harvesting zones, standardising where on a circuit harvesting must occur.
That, however, would most likely lead to far more predictable racing, as every driver would be harvesting and deploying energy at the same points.
Technical complications aside, there is also a structural problem.
The five-week window created by the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian Grands Prix gives the 9 April F1 Commission meeting some breathing space, but the FIA’s own post-race statement was cautious, saying, “At this stage, any speculation regarding the nature of potential changes would be premature.”
The FIA can modify sporting or technical regulations at any time without F1 Commission consent if it deems changes necessary for safety reasons, so it’s possible tweaks will be made before Miami.
The cautious FIA statement will not have delighted the drivers who are in no doubt that changes are a must. Their first warnings went without action. Bearman’s accident guaranteed that it can’t happen again.
