F1 2025

[MiniDave]

Things are just getting going in F1, they had the big reveal party where all 20 cars showed off their new looks for next season.

Lots of new and rookie drivers, and some familiar faces wearing new jumpers this year as several drivers swapped keys.

Testing gets started in a few days, then the first race in Mid March in Australia. Seems like it's been a LONG wait!

[Brit_in_TX]

It is going to be an interesting season. Large number of driver changes (only 2 teams have a static line up) and 5 rookies.

One rookie is already under pressure to perform (Doohan), with rumors that they will get replaced early in the season if they do not perform.

[BruceK]

This is sooooo cool. And very well produced. 

Edit: Well, apparently it can't be shown here. But follow the link, it will be well worth it.   

[MiniDave]

Fun!!!

Lando and McLaren were clearly the class of the field, and it looks like they may be the ones to beat for both championships this year. Only a late mistake in rain kept them from having a 1/2 race. Max went after them hard, so Red Bull will be a factor, tho the jury's still out on Lawson till he gets a few more starts this season.

The first race is now in the books, and as usual rain makes for some strange happenings. Sad for Isack whom we lost on the formation lap - he should take heart that he's not the first to do this, and in fact some have done it in absolutely dry conditions, let alone a damp slippery track.

Kimi had a stellar race to finish 4th behind Russell, putting a lot of credit in Wolf's decision to hire him for this season and beyond.....but it's just one race. Lets see how he does as the season progresses.

Ferrari had a shot at it, but once again was let down by poor decisions on the pit wall. Even tho both cars finished in the points, they're currently in 7th place behind Williams, Aston Martin and Kick Sauber for cripe's sake!

Only 2 of the 6 rookies made it to the end, but some really good, seasoned driver's like Alonso and Sainz also didn't either, so no shame there...

Next weekend at Shanghai, another challenging track, for both the track itself and weather, plus it's a night race. Lots of new experiences ahead for the rookies!

[Brit_in_TX]

It was an exciting race.  I hope we going to get some good racing this year and not have one team run away with it.

Albert Park is not very representative for the year as the surface is very abrasive compared to the majority of the circuits.

Lewis certainly was not a fan of his new race engineer being in his ear a lot.

[Brit_in_TX]

It was announced today that Eddie Jordan had passed away. 

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/eddie-jordan-1948-2025-obituary/10705114/

[MiniDave]

I saw that, only 76 years old. I read it was cancer that took him down.....he was a character!

He gave a lot of drivers an opportunity to get on the F1 grid.

Shanghai this weekend.....

[Brit_in_TX]

I read that he was talking about his diagnosis on his podcast and implied that he missed check ups so it was not caught as early as it could have been. He signed off with by stressing the importance of not delaying medical checkups and tests.

The interesting thing I learnt is he negotiated Adrian Newey's exit from Red Bull.

[MiniDave]

It's still only a Sprint race and he's only ahead by a few hundredths, but a pole is a pole! He did set a track record too!

Def seems like Hammy is starting to get the feel of the Ferrari, and he's a very popular driver with the crowds, so good on him! I think the move to the red cars has given him a newfound sense of fun on the track again.

Looking forward to seeing what he can do as the season progresses.

Ollie Bearman gave me HAAS hopes for a bit, but as the other cars ramped up they just fell down the order. Still, some glimmers of hope. Fun to see him faster than Ocon right out of the box! Still, 12th is way better than in Australia, we'll see how he finishes....

All of the rookies did pretty well today - well, except maybe Lawson. Lots of conversations about whether it's the car, or Lawson just not come to grips with it yet - cause Max is P2 and Lawson is dead last. Even Checo did better than that! 

[MiniDave]

Well, that was a bit of a surprise.....some of the front runners weren't and one front runner ran away from the field by the end!

Popular win, and I think it will give his team another shot in the arm!

I don't think it portends a championship by far, the competition is too even this year, but like I said - a good start!

Most of the rookies did pretty well too, and Kimi seems to be the class of the rookie field so far, much like George was when he joined MBZ.

[MiniDave]

Shanghai: Great race for some, not so much for others.....

McLaren scores a 1-2, with Piastri coming home ahead of Norris who was quickly running out of brakes - it will be interesting to hear why the McLaren lost its rear brakes like that.

LeClerc hit the Hamminator on the first corner and broke his wing, and then went even faster in the race, but it was to no avail as both he and Hamster were disqualified after the race - Hammy wore his plank down too far and LeClerc was underweight.

The result of having 3 people in the top 10 disqualified (Gasly also wore his plank down too far) meant that a lot of people moved into the top 10, including both HAAS cars, who scored a 5th and 8th, both Mercedes with Russell in 3rd and Kimi in 6th.

It's only the second race, but McLaren and Mercedes both have pretty good leads on the rest of the teams, with only Red Bull even close at this point.....Lawson not helping Max any as he again finishes out of the points, and only by virtue of disqualifications getting as good a result as he did....running dead last thru most of the race.

Japan is the next race and one where he's raced many times, so if he can't pull a decent result there I'll bet the wheels in Marko and Horner's heads will be spinning as to who might replace him. My guess is Tsunoda even tho Hadjar finished this race well ahead of him this time out. Lawson really hasn't come to grips with the Red Bull so maybe switching him with Tsunoda to give him some more wheel time would be a good move?

Or maybe Hadjar has done enough already to redeem himself? I think the next race will be a benchmark for both drivers.....all of the rookies save Lawson did pretty well this time out.

[Brit_in_TX]

The result of having 3 people in the top 10 disqualified (Gasly also wore his plank down too far) meant that a lot of people moved into the top 10, including both HAAS cars, who scored a 5th and 8th, both Mercedes with Russell in 3rd and Kimi in 6th.

Minor correction, Gasly was 11th before his disqualification.

[Brit_in_TX]

I feel really bad for Liam Lawson, he is being compared to a 4 time world champion in a car that even Max acknowledges is hard to drive.  Red Bull need to take a hard look at their car design and engineering as how many of Max's team mates have been dropped because they cannot keep pace with his team mate.  The only reason that Perez had a good run in 2022 and 2023 is that the car was so fast that he did not need to push it to the edge of its performance envelope to make pace.

Also, the Red Bull Junior program seems to be dead in the water, as their approach is not to give the drivers any seat time and expect them to be on pace.  In Drive to Survive, Liam Lawson said that he had not driven for 7 months before his mid season test with Red Bull and then has not been getting any off season driving opportunities.  To put that in context, Mercedes have been running Kimi Antonelli in older machinery almost every week in the off season, to prepare him.  Ferrari used up all of their available days for Lewis Hamilton to prepare for driving for his new team.

The other person in the Red Bull leadership that needs to be looked at is Helmut Marko, this constant failure of drivers in the Red Bull Junior program ultimately falls to him.

[MiniDave]

Unconfirmed report that they're swapping Liam and Yuki for Suzuka. In some ways it could work, if Yuki gets the car up to speed right away, they know the problem is Liam and they leave him at VCarb to get some more seat time. That car seems well sorted and would help him build his confidence back up. If Yuki does poorly, they've confirmed the problem is the car.

I think the problem IS the car, and I think they should have given Liam at least this run at Suzuka, as it's a track he knows and has done well on in the past, then if he has another terrible weekend, maybe then it's time to make a move.

We'll see if this is a factual report or someone's fantasy.......

[Brit_in_TX]

A youtube channel speculated that Honda is doubling their contribution to get Yuki into the Red Bull seat (10 million to 20 million), but they said he had to be in the seat for Suzuka (which is owned by Honda).

It will be interesting how Lawson goes in the Racing Bull or what every it is officially called now. I do hope he goes well, as he seems to be a nice kid.  Just needs time to knock the rust off.

[MiniDave]

If Yuki can some way some how actually drive the RedBull well, and manage to get in the points, then it will justify everything they've done, and show them Yuki should have been in that seat all along. I seriously doubt this will happen, cause I think the reason they've gone thru so many #2 drivers is that the car is a pig on roller skates to drive.

OTOH, the Vcarb is currently doing pretty well, and if they stop pulling a Ferrari and get their strategy right it looks like it can finish in the points pretty regularly. If THAT is the case, then Lawson will get another year to get up to speed, and I think it will do him well.

So....this will be an interesting weekend to watch an F1 race, and Netflix has got to be eating this stuff up for the D2S series! On top of this drama, you've got a tight race at the top between the 2 Big Macs, a resurgent Mercedes with a rookie driver who's the absolute best of this year's class and the Ferrari and Reds Bull fighting for the scraps, not to mention a decent outing by HAAS last weekend, a getting better but not quite there Alpine, and of course Vcarbs plus Albon and Sainz. So, lots to watch!

I wonder how the extra Honda money impacts the cap?

[Brit_in_TX]

As F1 teams are terrible about keeping secrets, what was known by everyone was officially announced - Lawson and Yuki are swapping seats.

I saw an interview with Alex Albon describing how Max likes a car vs how he likes it.  They both like a positive front end so they get good initial turn in.  Albon used the analogy of turning the sensitivity on your mouse all the way up, so you touch it and it flies across the screen.  Max likes the sensitivity all the way up and everyone else can't deal with it.

[MiniDave]

Suzuka:

So far I've only seen practices, but Yuki has been doing pretty well - he was within a 10th of Max in FP1.....it's been interesting  FP series, between Doohan's crash in FP1 (I could not believe how fast he went into the wall!) and the fires causes by sparks from the wear blocks they've had a record number of Red Flag periods.

The big money is on one of the McLaren boys to take pole, but I'm not so sure. Both the Mercs and Ferraris look strong from time to time, and you can never count out Max.

[MiniDave]

Well, that was interesting......and mostly boring in that the top six finished right where they started.

If I were Ferrari I would be concerned about being 14 sec back in 4th place at the end, when the top three were covered by less than 2 secs, Hambot finished in 7th. No question getting disqualified from the last race with both cars in good scoring positions hurt their championship chances for this season.

Yuki finished in 12th, not exactly covering himself in glory this weekend, but at least he finished well ahead of Lawson. Hadjar and Antonelli still the class of the rookies, but Bearman did well to bring the HAAS home in 10th, Ocon was well back in 18th, and Stroll brought up the back in dead last, where he was all weekend.

Sainz still hasn't come completely to grips with the Williams, which is kind of a surprise considering how well he went in the pre- season. I wonder what happened there?

Hamster still not getting the info he wants from his race engineer, he needs to get that sorted and quickly.

So it seems like the top 4 teams are just that, with probably any one of them capable of winning on any given weekend, and the edge going to McLaren and now Red Bull - or at least Max. I think if Yuki can get the Red Bull back to where he was in the Junior team that will be a good season for him, tho well below the team's expectations I'm sure.

All in all a pretty yawner of a race......

If McLaren keeps getting these 1-2 finishes at or near the front of the pack , it will be hard to catch them for the constructors championship again this season, tho I think the driver's is still up for grabs.

[MiniDave]

Bahrain:

Qually was very interesting, the Red Bulls are nowhere although they both managed to get into Q3.

Mercedes is def more competitive than they've been in the past, and Ferrari is managing to hang in there....

But the class of the race so far is Oscar Piastri, who got pole this time. He was the only driver to get into the 129's and took pole from Russell who looked like he might steal it for a while. Russell thinks the Mercedes can take it to the McLaren as the race goes on and the temps cool off.

Edit: Russell and Kimi both hit with 1 place penalties after qually for a rules infraction in Q2 , which moves LeClerc into 2nd. However, I think once DRS is enabled Russell might be able to get past as his straight line speed was really good.

I think the race tomorrow should be pretty fun, with the Mercs and the Macs going at it and the Ferrari hanging out just in case someone makes a goof.

[MiniDave]

Jedduh......qually.

Max did it again - of course you don't get points for being on pole, but in a tight street circuit that's difficult to pass on, being in front could mean a race win.

The top 10 has become a mixed bag, with both cars from McLaren, Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari all in there, and the occasional interloper from William, Vcarb, Alpine popping up.

All the top few are within milliseconds of each other.....it's hard to pick the winner any more. This weekend was supposed to be Ferrari's breakout race, but it's not looking much better than at any other time of this season so far. Still it's early times yet.

It's pretty clear that Aston is not doing anything with the 2025 car, and Stroll is hanging around at the very back of the pack with the Saubers/Kick - soon to be Audis - who also are clearly NOT developing the car. I guess it's good for giving their drivers experience, but it just seems a waste to me.

I really wonder if Stroll junior will make it to the 2026 car.....or if Newey has been whispering in Stroll Snr's ear that they need a better driver - or two! Rumors abound that they gave Max a billion dollar offer to come drive for them!

So this weeks race will feature:

P1 - Max
P2 - Piastri
P3 - Russell
P4 - Leclerc
P5 - Kimi
P6 - Sainz
P7 - Hamster
P8 - Yuki
P9 - Gasly
P10 - Norris (who crashed out on his first pull lap)

[MiniDave]

Pretty fun race for some of the guys, not so much for others......Yuki understeered into Gasly on the first lap and put both of them out.

Max on pole got a decent start but Piastri was a little quicker off the line and had a better line into the first corner, Max went to deep and had to cut the corner which kept him in first till the first pitstops, where he had to serve a 5 sec penalty. From then on Piastri had clear air and drove away. Max kept it close, finishing less than 3 sec behind him in second.

LeClerc drove a hard race and managed to bag his first podium of the year, Hamster said he was "fighting" the car on every corner, so it's clear he hasn't quite got the hang of the Ferrari yet.....he finished 7th, right where he started.

Norris had a good race, he crashed in Q3 so he started 10th and drove hard to finish 4th, he was closing hard on LeClerc but ran out of laps.

With the 1st and 4th scores McLaren is now 77 points ahead of 2nd place Mercedes, Red Bull third a further 22 points back and Ferrari has improved to 4th, only 11 points behind Red Bull by virtue of getting both cars in the points every race - if they hadn't had both cars disqualified in that one race they would be ahead of Red Bull now.

Sainz and Albon both finished in the points, as did both Mercedes and Isack Hadjar brought up the end in 10th. Kimi is clearly the better of the rookies this season, but I'm pretty impressed with Hadjar too.

The next race is Miami, if the Hamster can get the Ferrari figured out they stand to have a decent season, but I think the chances of any team catching McLaren for the title is a long shot.

Driver's championship tho is up for grabs as Piastri is 10 points ahead of Norris in 2nd, Max only 2 pts back of him in third and Russell 14 points behind Max and still able to pull forward if he gets a win. However, it's clear that the two Big Mac boys will be fighting for it all the way to the end, and while Norris was favored pre-season, it's clear that Paistri might have something to say about it, especially now with two wins under his belt.

[MiniDave]

Miami - FP1

This is a Sprint weekend, so the teams really only get one practice session and some of the teams really made the most of it. While running on the medium tires both Russell and Kimi were head of the pack, when the teams all went to softs for a qually run they faded down the order to 7th and 9th respectively.

Notables, Sainz and Albon both in the top 5, Max in third behind LeClerc and leader Pastri who def seems to have the measure of the McLaren these days.

In 6th Isack Hadjar who is def making Liam not look good as the best he could do was 11th

In the same vein Norris was down in 12th and the Hamminator in 13th!

And what the heck is up with Stroll the lesser? Dead last in the last three events when Alonso made 10th?

However, Ollie hit the wall with 4.5 minutes left so some of the drivers did not get in their fast lap on softs.

Sprint Qually is up now, we'll see how they go, but I'm thinking unless someone catches a wall or a curb the order will not be close to the final FP1 order except for the top few.

[MiniDave]

Clearly Mercedes has something for the rest, as Kimi goes pole in the Sprint, Russell only 5th

After Kimi come Piastri and Norris, then Max in 4th

6&7 to LeClerc and Hammy

Hadjar gets 9th and Alonso 10th

Should be an interesting sprint race then.....having to get used to the pink Mercedes uniforms!

[MiniDave]

Miami - Sprint Race

Well, that was interesting - nothing like a good rain storm to confuse everything!

The track dried out and Lewis came in first for softs, and from that point on he was the absolute fastest man on the track and went from 15th after his stop to  finishing third.

Wrecks abounded.....LeClerc wrecked on the formation lap because the rain was so bad they red flagged the formation lap, but still counted it? When cars started to pit for slick tires, they released Verstappen directly into Kimi, Sainz clipped a wall and left debris all over the track, Lawson took out Alonso and more debris hit the track.....the race finished under yellow and the safety car, so the cars were fairly bunched up at the end. They penalized Verstappen 10 seconds which took him from 4th to 16th.....just like last year the safety car benefitted Norris, who managed to come out ahead of Piastri and Hamilton as they were slowed by the yellows and safety car, so he wound up in the lead and simply followed the safety car home for the win. Piastri is NOT happy as he pretty much had this one sewn up.

What a cluster! I think there may be more penalties given out before it's all done too.....

The real scary part is how many cars will have to be rebuilt in time for qually in just a few hours - and more rain is coming. There may be a lot of cars starting from the pit lane, which will also complicate things on the first lap as those faster cars will be trying to move up as quickly as possible...

And.....

It's supposed to rain tomorrow for the race!