Something shocking happened in Sepang today. Formula One revealed itself as a sport that can only be contested in dry conditions, or, to be more accurate, near-dry conditions.Before we get to that, the brilliance of Max Verstappen – a champion for every season – won the race from Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli in second place, while George Russell, who had run third, retired with an apparent engine problem, his hopes of snatching the title sluiced away again. He shook his head as he leapt out of his car, 84 points back from Antonelli, or a million miles, with seven rounds to go.Lewis Hamilton took the final podium place for Ferrari, a fine drive by him through the field from more than a minute back after being put on slick tyres rather than the intermediates most of his rivals were wearingBut the subject of salient note here was that this generation of cars, with their half-internal combustion engine, half-battery power components, seem incapable of racing when the road is wet.The race was effectively delayed 1hr 33min as a result, which underlines this point one of the sport’s most embarrassing episodes since Indianapolis in 2005, when six cars started to hoots of derision, because of concerns over the Michelin tyres at the great oval track. Formula One was plunged into embarrassment at the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia The new generation of cars were incapable of performing in heavy rainThis was almost as bad, if not as derided or as obvious. But, still, absurd.The conditions were poor but not awful, the rain hardly biblical. Yes, we stood on the grid with umbrellas, and your shoes got wet.But it was not biblical rain. I have been here in Sepang, an hour or more south of Kuala Lumpur, and seen the ocean fall out of the sky. This was tame by comparison in an area of the world that employs people to do the easiest job in the world – weathermen and weatherwomen. ‘Humid today, stormy later.’ Take the rest of the day off.Some afternoons you can almost drown by the Petronas Towers.The rain on Sunday was never a reason not to get on with it.Yet that is how it was and no proper explanation was given for the delay. It was also a shame because the Bahrainis staged their grand prix here because of the war in the Middle East, and in so many ways accomplished it so well. Five hundred-plus marshals and officials were here, as well as the pioneering Crown Prince, Salman.It was well-organised in every aspect, down to the last detail, even if the journey by road was slow, the traffic sticky. KL is a big city and that is how it is, no escape. The atmosphere, though, was brilliant and no complaints on that front.But the race itself, overseen by Rui Marques, the Portuguese race director, turned into a farce.First, there was a 40-minute delay as rain fell.Why? Sunday’s race was delayed by over an hour-and-a-half due to strong rainIt is a fair question. Formula One has been held in rain all over the world over many years. Hamilton danced in it at Silverstone, in 2008. It was a defining moment of his career.After winning seven championships, he does not recall every jot and spittle of his time in the sport across two decades, every race, but he remembers that one. The conditions then in the Midlands of England were far worse than those today.You turn back through the pages of history. For example, James Hunt in Japan in 1976, when he took the title and the immortal Niki Lauda pulled out, ceding the honour to ‘Master James’ claiming that to race on would be ‘insanity’.We add Ayrton Senna at Donington in 1993. It was one of the drives that distinguished his extraordinary gifts.Michael Schumacher was called the Rain Meister.Verstappen, victorious by two seconds in Sepang, drove to the best victory I have seen live in my life in a near-monsoon in Sao Paulo, Brazil, two years ago.Yet here the drivers sat kicking their heels in their garages while they awaited the call to arms. Finally, they were allowed a formation lap.Several complained they could not accelerate, their cars basically hostage to conditions.Pole-man Verstappen said he could ‘not accelerate’. He later could, randomly picking up pace, but other cars momentarily broke down, including the Ferrari of Hamilton, which for a few seconds sat at the side of the track. He then got going again. Others accelerated and then decelerated. It was like nothing ever seen before.The race was red-flagged for 53 minutes. It was as though nothing could move until the track was dry. Verstappen went on to secure his first win of 2026 but questions will cloud the new F1 carsThis was a disastrous look. Fernando Alonso, the double world champion driving for Aston Martin, asked why the delay. ‘It’s racing,’ he protested. He was right.Anthony Davidson, the former Honda F1 driver who still tests with Mercedes, tried to explain on Sky the almost inexplicable. It goes to the heart of the drawback of the new regulations. ‘A lot of it comes down to the homework that should have been done before these wet conditions,’ he said. ‘A lot of it can be simulated.‘Basically, if you run the engines too slowly, the turbo spools down because we don’t have the MGU-H (an engine component) anymore.‘What’s effectively happening is if you are off throttle for too long, the turbo spools down and when the drivers put their foot back down it uses all the engine juice.‘As soon as the battery goes flat, you are down to internal combustion engine power only. And because it can’t reach the drivers’ torque demand anymore, because the engine is not creating the power because you have no turbo, you go outside of the FIA’s regulations.‘It’s all there to stop teams having traction control. It’s incredibly complicated and you fall into this horrible trap where the engine can’t reaccelerate because you are being penalised by this regulation.’As for the race, Verstappen lost out on the lead off the line but was passed by the Mercedes pair of Russell and Antonelli but he resumed the lead he never surrendered on lap 13 after a poor re-start by Antonelli. All over.But Antonelli, even though the runner-up, commands a title race that has never taken fire.