Nikolas Tombazis: the championship-winner shaping F1’s next generation

F1: Beyond The Grid

karenellenbevan

Leisure, Sports, Technology, Automotive

4.8 • 5.2K Ratings

🗓️ 11 June 2024

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

He’s an engineer who won Formula 1 World Championships with Michael Schumacher and Kimi Raikkonen. Now he’s working on the rules of the sport for 2026 and beyond.

Nikolas Tombazis is the Director of Single Seaters for the FIA. He is overseeing the regulations for the 2026 season, when F1 cars will be lighter, smaller and sustainably fuelled, with greater battery power and revolutionary active aerodynamics. He tells Tom Clarkson how the new rules have been designed to create close, competitive racing which is thrilling to watch.

Nikolas also looks back at his career in F1, when he enjoyed domination and experienced disappointment. Championships with Michael Schumacher at Benneton were followed by more success at Ferrari, with Schumi and Kimi Raikkonen. A move to McLaren during a difficult period brought challenges. His return to Ferrari brought agony as Fernando Alonso missed out on the 2010 title, in a showdown which still plays on Tombazis’ mind.

Experience Formula 1 live in 2024
Tickets for the United States Grand Prix in Austin, the Las Vegas Grand Prix and races around the world are available now at tickets.formula1.com

This episode is sponsored by:

Salesforce: visit salesforce.com/F1 to learn more about how Formula 1 wins fans and grows its global fanbase with Salesforce

Indeed: get a seventy-five dollar sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at indeed.com/GRID.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	In 2026 and beyond, we're expecting to hear lots more of this.
0:08.6	Across the line, he gets close, he just hangs on in a superb finish to the line.
0:15.2	It was decided for third place by 53,000th of a second.
0:20.8	With moreover of a second. With more overtaking opportunities and closer wheel to wheel battles
0:28.3	the FIA's new for 26 regulations are designed to create even more thrilling Formula One racing.
0:35.6	Clearly my hope is that it would be very competitive out of the box.
0:38.6	My hope is we'll have different teams winning and periods when they go up and down and so on. Invariably with new
0:44.8	rules there will be somebody who gets it wrong and who finds themselves in a rather
0:48.6	embarrassing spot to start with but I do think we're putting some things together to make sure it's more competitive in the long run.
0:56.0	Overseeing Formula One's new rules is the FIA's Nicholas Tombasis,
1:00.8	a man who knows exactly what it takes to maximize performance within the regulations.
1:06.3	During 25 years as an aerodynamicist, he won multiple world titles with Ferrari and Beneton.
1:13.0	At some point I started thinking that's far too easy, it's not really that challenging, no matter what we do, we win.
1:21.0	In later stages of my career I was thinking how stupid was I to be thinking that
1:26.8	wins are easy and guaranteed because obviously I went through other phases of my career when
1:30.6	wins were not coming and then that was really really tough so I felt you know they
1:35.8	didn't appreciate the winds when they were happening so easily. Hello and welcome to F1 Beyond the Grid. I'm Tom Clarkson and my guess this week is the
1:51.7	FIA's Director of Singleseaters Nicholas Tom Bassis.
1:55.7	He and his team at the FIA are introducing new regulations that will transform the sport from
2:01.5	2026.
2:03.0	Formula One cars will be lighter and more agile,
2:06.0	engines will have more power,
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -246 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from karenellenbevan, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of karenellenbevan and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.