F1's single seaters director Nikolas Tombazis discussed the new regulations, the impact they've had so far on the sport and their future in an interview to Gazzetta.it

Tombazis said that having such a late engine upgrade isn't ideal, as everything is frozen until 2026, but that so far all the engines appear to be at a same level:

"First of all, no one among the four engine makers is having a hard time at the moment, their performance are equal. When the engine freeze was discussed it was decided that, had one of them have particular issues, everyone would take part in thinking how to solve the problem, maybe allowing some upgrades."

"There is no interest in forcing someone to stay at the back of the grid for four years. It's not ideal to have such a long engine freeze, but we had to do it because otherwise it would have been unsustainable for the constructors to develop both these power units and those to be introduced in 2026."

Tombazis also confirmed that "an engine cap" will also be introduced in the future.

He went on to talk about the controversial budget cap implementation, and, especially after Mattia Binotto's call for a strict surveillance on its respect he highlighted the severity of the standards F1 holds its competitors to:

"Our very first goal is making sure that the championship is "clean", we want the winner to be worth of it. Nowadays, the regulations need more resources to do controls. In the past, weighting the cars and checking their track widths and displacements was enough. Now we have to inspect what the teams do in their own factories, but we have a capable team leaded by Federico Lodi."

"We are doing everything we can to keep the situation under control. We have financial experts to check the economical balance and the parts made for the cars to make sure everything has been counted in."

Tombazis confirmed that big crashes, such as what happened to Schumacher in Jeddah, won't be a valid excuse to not stick to the budget cap, or costs not to be counted in it:

"If I have an accident and crash my car I will have to spend less to go on holiday, but it has always been like this. There are many budget waivers already - so many that they will be revised - but they don't cover crashes like Mick's."

The F1 technical director is surprised by the interse fight at the front of the grid that happened in the first two races of the season, but warns that it'll be difficult to have a title fight as close as last year's even with the new regulations:

"I wouldn't have been surprised to see a single car able to dominate, so we have started better [than I thought]!"

"I also expect other teams to join the top fight in the next months, but to have another situation like last year's, where it all came down to the last race with two drivers level on points, you need luck. This is not the goal of the new regulations."

Another heavily discussed part of the new rules was the DRS. Tombazis isn't glad it's still needed at the moment, but reckons its importance:

"Eliminating it would have been good, but with cars that produce so much load and the slipstream, that, even if reduced, wasn't completely removed, it can't be done. However, the DRS zones can be reduced, we don't want easy overtakes."