Williams recruit Carlos Sainz has thrown down a gauntlet to Formula 1’s rulemakers, suggesting that the sport’s restricted testing limits are woefully inadequate.
After a mere day-and-a-half behind the wheel of his new machine last week in Bahrain, Sainz found himself questioning the logic of a system that prioritizes simulator hours over actual track time.
“It feels weird that I got a day and a half and now I need to go racing,” the freshy minted Williams driver said. “It feels not enough, it feels very little. Ridiculously little, the amount of time that we get into our cars before going to a race.”
Sainz’s frustration isn’t just personal. As a newly appointed director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, he’s got his eye on the six rookies gearing up for their full-season debut in Melbourne later this month.
“I’m just obviously wishing them all the best and understanding a bit their frustration with testing, because even though I’m obviously no rookie, that day-and-a-half of testing I think is frustrating for me too but I cannot imagine [how it is] for a rookie,” he admitted, quoted by RaceFans.
“I understand how difficult that makes things and how tricky the start of the season will be for some of these guys.”
The Spaniard pointed to the Testing of Previous Cars (TPC) rules, now hemmed in by mileage caps, as a partial fix.
“If you could get that TPC car [running] also, that is relevant and that can still help a lot, but experience is experience and you only gain that on-track with a real car that you are going to drive that the year.”
Simulators Under Fire
While F1 teams lean heavily on simulators – running them endlessly, even mid-race weekend with live data – Sainz isn’t sold on their supremacy.
He’s pushing for a radical rethink: cap simulator hours and let teams bankroll more real-world testing instead.
“I think F1, if I’m honest, could do a bit of an effort in trying to do a better job in how we go testing,” he declared.
“You have a lot of teams spending infinite amounts of money in simulators, to have drivers flying to the UK from Monaco to go to the simulator, and I don’t understand why we get three days of testing when all that money could be invested into – I don’t know – eight days of testing.”
A Modest Proposal
Sainz’s vision is pragmatic yet bold. “I’m not asking for too much. Eight, 10 days where every team picks their places to test.
“It’s nice to have a collective test, I think it should stay, but my proposal would be to put in the budget cap the number of [test] days, put in the budget cap the simulator also, and see where the teams want to spend their money, if it’s in the sim or if it’s in 10 testing days,” he explained.
For him, the choice is clear: “Rookies would benefit and I think F1 teams would benefit because even though the simulators are good, they are not as good as some of the engineers or people tend to believe they are.
“So I would always choose testing and for [the rookies] also than to go into a simulator.”
With Williams charging into a new era, Sainz’s plea resonates beyond the garage. It’s a rallying cry for a sport teetering between virtual precision and the raw, irreplaceable feel of the track.
As F1’s budget-conscious era evolves, Sainz is betting on rubber meeting asphalt – not pixels – to sharpen the grid’s edge. Whether the powers-that-be listen could shape the fate of veterans and newcomers alike.
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