Qatar and Abu Dhabi Doubts Threaten to Shrink F1's 2026 Title Run-In
With the final two rounds in the Gulf still unconfirmed, cancellation would cut the season to 21 races and could hand Andrea Kimi Antonelli the title before Austin.
Formula 1 has yet to confirm that the Qatar and Abu Dhabi Grands Prix, the last two of 2026’s 23 scheduled rounds, will go ahead, as uncertainty across the Middle East hangs over the end of the season. RacingNews365 has examined the latest position on both events and set the question against the US midterm elections in early November. Six rounds remain on paper, starting with the United States Grand Prix in Austin on 25 October. Whether that number is really six, five or four will decide more than where the paddock spends late November.
Two Gulf races still without a green light
The Gulf has become central to F1’s commercial model over the past 15 years. Yas Marina has closed every season since 2014 and traditionally hosts the post-season test. Qatar, a one-off in 2021, returned in 2023 on a long-term deal. Both rank among the sport’s most lucrative hosting agreements, and F1 would not drop either lightly.
That is why the lack of a firm decision matters. Promoters, teams, broadcasters and freight planners all work months ahead, and the longer the question stays open, the narrower the options become. An early call allows contingency planning. A late one tends to leave outright cancellation as the only choice.
The political backdrop is beyond F1’s control, and the sport should not pretend otherwise. The welfare of everyone who travels with the championship, from drivers to catering crews, has to be the deciding factor. Revenue cannot be. But F1 does control how quickly and how clearly it decides, and that is where it can be judged.
How the arithmetic changes if the Gulf rounds go
With no sprints left on the 2026 schedule, the most any driver can score at a race weekend is 25 points. That makes the maths unusually stark.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli leads his Mercedes team-mate George Russell by 102 points, with eight wins to Russell’s three. Mercedes have dominated the year, and the size of the gap means the calendar itself could settle the title.
| Calendar from Austin | Rounds left | Points available | Antonelli’s lead | Title status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Both Gulf races held | 6 | 150 | 102 | Open; Antonelli clinches in Austin by winning with Russell 10th or lower and Hamilton fifth or lower |
| One Gulf race cancelled | 5 | 125 | 102 | Open, but Antonelli clinches in Austin unless Russell outscores him there by two points or more, Hamilton by 11 or more, or Verstappen by 19 or more |
| Both Gulf races cancelled | 4 | 100 | 102 | Antonelli champion once the cancellations are confirmed |
The third line is the one that should focus minds. If both races are cancelled, Antonelli becomes world champion without turning a wheel at the Circuit of the Americas. Lewis Hamilton (111 behind), Max Verstappen (119), Charles Leclerc (125) and Lando Norris (139) would all be eliminated at the same moment.
Even on the full calendar, the fight is close to over. Antonelli finished third in Singapore while Russell recovered from 19th on the grid to ninth, but even that recovery could not stop the gap growing by 13 points to 102. Russell needs a run of wins and some misfortune for his team-mate. Removing even one round leaves him almost no margin for error.
Some will argue that a title decided by cancellation would be devalued. That argument does not hold up. Antonelli has scored 340 points across 17 rounds and won nearly half of them. Hamilton’s 2020 crown came from a 17-race season, and nobody seriously treats it as lesser. Championships reward the races that happen, and the 2026 standings already tell a clear story.
The fights below Antonelli that lose most
The drivers’ title is the headline, but the real casualties of a shortened season sit further down the order.
The battle for runner-up is the most open contest left in F1. Russell (238), Hamilton (229), Verstappen (221), Leclerc (215) and Norris (201) are covered by 37 points. Verstappen’s win from pole in Singapore, with Leclerc second and Hamilton sixth, compressed that group further. Over six rounds, any of the five could finish second. Over four, the order is far more likely to stay as it is, which helps Russell and hurts the chasers.
The constructors’ table carries the bigger financial stakes. Mercedes lead Ferrari by 134 points, and a team can score at most 43 points per weekend. Mercedes have not clinched under any scenario, but four rounds would leave Ferrari needing near-perfect results. The sharper fight is for third. McLaren sit on 339 points and Red Bull on 332, a margin of seven. In Singapore, Red Bull took 26 points to McLaren’s 22, with Verstappen’s win doing the heavy lifting while Isack Hadjar climbed from 22nd to 10th. Every round removed favours McLaren, the team in front. Because prize money is paid by finishing position, a cancelled race is worth real money to one of them and costs the other.
At the back, Cadillac are still waiting for their first point in their debut season. Sergio Pérez finished 17th and Valtteri Bottas 19th in Singapore. Fewer races means fewer chaotic afternoons in which a newcomer can pick up a stray point. Aston Martin, on seven points, and Williams, on 12, would also lose chances to improve their positions.
Bahrain, Melbourne, Jeddah and Imola: lessons from lost races
F1 has faced this kind of decision before, and the record is instructive.
In 2011, the Bahrain Grand Prix was first postponed amid unrest in the country, then cancelled outright after months of uncertainty that pleased nobody. In 2020, the Australian Grand Prix was called off hours before first practice, with teams already in Melbourne, before the pandemic forced a complete rebuild of the calendar. In 2022, a missile strike on an oil facility near the Jeddah circuit during practice led to a long meeting between drivers and senior figures before the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix went ahead. Several drivers later made clear how uneasy that night had been. In 2023, flooding in Emilia-Romagna cancelled Imola, and the race was never replaced.
Two lessons stand out. First, races cancelled late in the season are rarely replaced. The 2020 calendar was an exception made possible by a global shutdown, when circuits were available and teams had nothing else to do. With the season’s end only weeks away, finding a venue, a promoter and a freight plan for a replacement round would be close to impossible. If the Gulf races go, the season will almost certainly end at 21 rounds.
Second, uncertainty that drags on does its own damage. Bahrain in 2011 showed how a slow decision leaves teams, fans and the host stuck. Jeddah in 2022 showed what happens when a decision is effectively made in a drivers’ meeting at midnight. Neither is a model to repeat.
Why F1 should name a deadline now
The sport’s position is understandable. Qatar and Abu Dhabi are valuable partners, and nobody wants to cancel too early if the situation might settle. The US political calendar adds another variable, and RacingNews365’s framing suggests the timing of any decision may be linked to it.
But waiting has a cost, and the teams pay it. Freight, staff travel and hospitality cannot be organised in a fortnight. The fairest approach would be to set a public decision date, ideally before the circus leaves the Americas, and stick to it. That gives teams a fixed point to plan around. It also spares the sport another Melbourne or Jeddah, where the decision is effectively forced at the track.
There is also a matter of sporting integrity. Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull are all making development and resource decisions for the final weeks based on how many races remain. Car upgrades, power unit allocations and the balance between 2026 and next season all depend on that figure. An unclear calendar distorts those choices in ways that never show up in the results table.
Antonelli will very likely be champion whatever happens. A 102-point lead is too big for the calendar to change the destination, only the date. The contests that matter now are the ones behind him. A five-way fight for second and a seven-point battle between McLaren and Red Bull deserve to be settled on track over as many rounds as can be safely run. If those rounds cannot happen, F1 owes its teams an answer while they are still in the Americas, not once the freight is already bound for the Gulf.