F1
Has F1’s ADUO failed at the first hurdle?
ADUO was Formula 1’s insurance policy against another decade of engine dominance. Its first verdict appears to have done the opposite
What the FIA's ADUO verdict confirms about Red Bull's problem
F1
F1's benchmark engine continues to be no match to its rivals on track, and the FIA's latest verdict has confirmed there's no relief coming soon
Red Bull's power unit remains the benchmark, according to the FIA
Grand Prix Photo
The FIA announced the results of the first two Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities (ADUO) review periods of 2026, and Red Bull comes out of both in the same position it has spent three months arguing against: the benchmark engine of the grid, and the only manufacturer with no additional development to show for it.
On Wednesday, F1’s ruling body confirmed the results of both completed ADUO review periods of 2026 together: the first, concluded after Canada, and the second, covering Monaco to Hungary.
The first period’s findings, previously known only informally and internally by the manufacturers, were officially revealed to the public for the first time yesterday.
Mercedes fell into the 2-4% performance window behind the leading ICE and was awarded one additional homologation in 2026 and another in 2027, with corresponding cost cap and dyno increases.
Audi, Ferrari and Honda were all more than 4% adrift, and each received two additional homologations in both years.
Red Bull was the reference point – the benchmark ICE against which everyone else was measured, and therefore entitled to nothing.
The FIA’s second verdict is unlikely to please Red Bull
The second period, for which the results were announced in a brief FIA statement on Wednesday afternoon, changed none of it for Red Bull, unnamed in the FIA’s statement but identifiable by omission.
“For the second period, no additional homologations were granted to any of the Power Unit Manufacturers,” the FIA said.
Red Bull, now sitting a distant fourth in the standings behind Mercedes, Ferrari and Mercedes-powered McLaren, remains the benchmark.
Nobody else’s gap moved enough, in either direction, to shift their allowance.
A startling benchmark
That a first-time manufacturer had apparently outperformed Mercedes, Ferrari and Honda in its debut season was startling enough back in June.
That it had done so while sitting sixth in the constructors’ championship, and now closer to third- or fourth-fastest on a given weekend, made it harder to explain away.
The FIA’s single-seater director Nikolas Tombazis defended the process again on confirming the numbers: “The FIA has undertaken thorough and exhaustive analysis as part of our ADUO review process.
“With the release of the findings of period 2, we are confident that, based on the quality of the data, its analysis is incredibly robust, giving us a high level of confidence in our findings.”
He added the usual caveat about it being the mechanism’s first year: “There are areas which we may evolve over time, in discussion with all the PU manufacturers.”
No performance index figures were released, with the FIA citing manufacturer confidentiality.
Mercedes’ engines have won 10 of 12 races so far this year
Grand Prix Photo
Red Bull has disagreed with the substance of that confidence since Monaco, with team principal Laurent Mekies leading the case directly with the FIA and CEO Oliver Mintzlaff reportedly becoming personally involved too.
Asked in Austria whether the delay in reaching a conclusion risked leaving Red Bull permanently locked out while its rivals kept developing everything except the ICE, Mekies didn’t dispute the premise.
“There is a large risk there for Red Bull, so you are completely right in exposing that risk,” he said. “It is one of the reasons why it is vital for Red Bull, and more generally for the sport, that we get that picture right.”
He added that Red Bull would rather the FIA take longer and land on the correct answer than move fast and get it wrong: “You always would like to reach an earlier conclusion, but it’s more important that we reach the right one, even if it takes a bit more time.”
Tellingly, Mekies also said at the time that Red Bull had not altered its development plan while it waited.
“At the moment, we are not changing any strategy, because these results are not a conclusion as it stands,” he said, adding that a short delay to Red Bull’s own programme was a price worth paying next to “the wrong answer and having heavy consequences both in ’26 and in ’27.”
That framing assumed the FIA’s conclusion was still open.
After Wednesday’s announcement, it no longer is, at least for this period, and the substance Mekies was worried about has already been happening regardless.
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Ferrari introduced its first ADUO-enabled specification in Austria, Audi a smaller driveability update near Barcelona, and Honda a more significant horsepower- and combustion-focused upgrade that debuted competitively at Zandvoort on Aston Martin’s cars.
All that was spent from period-one allowances, all arriving while Red Bull’s own token count stayed at zero.
Mercedes, having held its single token back through June, is now reported – though not confirmed – to be preparing its own Monza-specification upgrade in response to a second Ferrari step also expected there.
The exact scenario Mekies was pressed on in Austria, every rival upgrading around Red Bull while it upgrades nothing, is no longer hypothetical. It is now the confirmed state of the sport heading into Monza next week.
What Wednesday’s announcement actually settles is not whether Red Bull’s engine is good – the FIA insists its data is robust and has now doubled down on it – but how long a team can be told it is the class of the field on the one metric it isn’t allowed to develop, while finishing behind the teams it’s supposedly ahead of.
The third review period, covering the Dutch Grand Prix to Mexico, is the next point at which that question gets asked again. Nothing so far suggests the answer will look different.
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