When Hakkinen squeezed past Schumacher around the outside of Les Combes at Spa in 2000, the move required three ingredients: a faster car through Eau Rouge, the commitment to stay on the outside into a braking zone with a wall nearby, and the presence of a backmarker that forced Schumacher to take the inside line. It was a pass built on timing, bravery, and the smallest of windows.
Twenty-three years later, at the same circuit, Verstappen overtook Russell for the lead by activating his Active Aero low-drag mode on the Kemmel Straight, deploying overtake energy, and completing the move before the braking zone. The tools were different, the engineering was different, but the moment — one driver proving to another that they were faster, right now — was the same.
The raw era: bravery without aids (1950s-1970s)
In the first decades of Formula 1, overtaking was a straightforward physical contest. Cars had minimal aerodynamic grip, narrow tires, and primitive brakes. The difference in performance between cars was often large, which meant that faster cars could pass slower ones on pure speed advantage.
But the cost of a mistake was extreme. Cars offered almost no crash protection, circuits had no run-off areas, and the line between a successful pass and a fatal accident was thin. Every overtake required a driver to commit to a gap that might not exist by the time they arrived.
The overtakes from this era that survive in memory — Clark sweeping around the outside at Spa, Stewart's calculated passes in the rain — are remembered because they combined speed with a willingness to accept risk that would be unthinkable in modern F1.
The aerodynamic era: the dirty air problem (1980s-2000s)
As F1 cars generated more downforce through the 1980s and 1990s, the wake turbulence behind them became a serious obstacle for following cars. The chasing car would lose front-end grip in dirty air, slide wider through corners, and arrive on the straight with less speed — the opposite of what an attacking driver needed.
This was the era when qualifying became disproportionately important. Starting at the front meant running in clean air, controlling the pace, and rarely needing to overtake. Races at circuits like Monaco, Hungary, and Magny-Cours became processional because the aerodynamic penalty of following was too high.
The passes that did happen were precious because they were so difficult. Hakkinen on Schumacher at Spa 2000, Mansell on Patrese at Hungary 1991, and Alonso on Schumacher around the outside at Barcelona 2013 are iconic precisely because the cars made them near-impossible.
The refueling era (1994-2009) added a strategic dimension: many "overtakes" happened in the pit lane rather than on track, as cars with different fuel loads traded track position during stops. This created the illusion of more action, but the actual on-track passing remained limited.
The DRS era: manufactured passing (2011-present)
DRS was introduced in 2011 as a direct response to the overtaking crisis. By allowing a chasing driver to open a flap in the rear wing on designated straights when within one second of the car ahead, the FIA created an artificial speed advantage that made straight-line passes easier.
The numbers increased dramatically. Some circuits saw overtaking figures double or triple compared to pre-DRS seasons. But the quality of the passing changed. A DRS overtake often required only that a driver reach the detection point within one second; the actual pass on the straight was frequently a formality.
The DRS train — a chain of cars that can all use DRS on each other but none can escape — became a familiar frustration. At circuits like Jeddah and Baku, entire groups of cars would circulate in stalemate because DRS cancelled out across the field.
The 2022 ground-effect regulations tried to reduce dirty air and improve following, and they helped. But overtaking remained heavily DRS-dependent. The fundamental tension — that easier passing is not always better passing — was unresolved.
Circuit-specific overtaking: why venue matters
Not all overtaking is equal, and the circuit plays a major role. Some tracks produce genuinely exciting racing because their layout rewards different approaches:
- Spa-Francorchamps: Eau Rouge gives a slipstream advantage, and Les Combes is a genuine braking zone where late moves work.
- Bahrain and Shanghai: long straights into heavy braking zones create natural passing opportunities even without DRS.
- Monaco and Singapore: overtaking is nearly impossible, so qualifying and strategy become the race.
The best overtaking circuits share a feature: they have corners where the preceding section compresses the field (tight turns, chicanes) followed by a straight where the speed differential can be used. The worst circuits have sequences of medium-speed corners that spread the field and make following painful.
The 2026 Active Aero era: a different approach
The 2026 regulations replace DRS with Active Aero, which allows drivers to switch between high-downforce and low-drag configurations on both front and rear wings. Combined with the manual Overtake Mode and Boost system for energy deployment, this creates a more varied set of overtaking tools.
The key difference from DRS is that Active Aero is not binary. Drivers must decide when to switch modes, how much energy to deploy, and whether to use their allocation early or save it. The system rewards tactical thinking rather than simple proximity at a detection point.
Whether it produces better racing than DRS remains to be seen, but the intent is clear: to make overtaking a skill again rather than an entitlement.
Why the overtake remains F1's most thrilling moment
The tools have changed across six decades — from raw bravery to ground-effect aerodynamics to DRS to Active Aero — but the fundamental appeal has not. An overtake is one driver telling another: I am faster, and I am going to prove it right now. The engineering may differ, but the human moment at the center is the same.
That is why overtaking will always be the heart of Formula 1. It is the moment when strategy, skill, and courage converge in a single move — and the driver who executes it best walks away with the position.