The 2024 Formula One season is just around the corner. With a little over a month before the lights go out in Bahrain, these are just a few things that F1 fans, new and old alike, can look forward to in an exciting upcoming season.
1. New Challengers to Max Verstappen and Red Bull
Dominance in F1 is nothing new. There have been multiple points throughout Formula One’s longstanding history where both drivers and constructors go on multiple-year runs of shutting out the rest of the competition. Mercedes, Ferrari, and even prior Red Bull teams have all experienced large stretches of dominance.
This dominance, however, could be set to expire… and sooner than many think. Last season saw Verstappen win 19 of the 22 races on the F1 calendar. This marks both the most wins by any single driver and the highest percentage of wins by any single driver in any F1 season to date. While these numbers seem like a mountain to conquer for any contender, the second half of last season showcased that Red Bull can be vulnerable.
While Mercedes and Ferrari will always attempt to continue to chip away at Red Bull’s overall progress, McLaren and Lando Norris were the surprise partnership that seemed to get the closest to dethroning the Dutch racing deity last season. Norris, still chasing his first Formula One win, came painstakingly close on numerous occasions, finishing in second a whopping six times. If McLaren can continue this progress in the new season, they could become a real thorn in the side of Christain Horner (RB Team Principal) and Red Bull Racing.
2. Silly Season: The 2025 Drivers Market
The end of the 2023 F1 campaign was very peculiar in an unprecedented and unique way. For the first time in the competition’s history, the 20-driver grid stayed exactly the same. No new drivers were signed, no drivers swapped teams, and no drivers were pushed out. This very bizarre occurrence now forces the racing series into a situation where over half of the grid will be out of contract at the end of the 2024 season.
13 of the 20 drivers will be racing for more than just points and podiums but for their potential futures in the series itself. The looming shadow of this ultra-competitive drivers market should help to cultivate an extremely cut-throat environment this year, pushing drivers to their limits in an attempt to showcase their best racing skills.
3. Colleague Competition
F1 may have ten teams of two drivers, but it certainly is not a team sport. Some of the most gripping and passionate battles are the ones that occur within the teams themselves. Whether a teammate is pushing for the number one spot or trying to hold onto it, there is always a fair amount of turmoil within every team as the season goes on. These intra-constructor rivalries will only be heightened as many drivers, 10 of them coming from the same teams, will be out of contract at the end of the season. This means that there are 5 full teams of drivers racing for their lives in this sport.
Naturally, as every driver has remained in their seat, rivalries from last season will only continue to fester. Anything that has been held under the surface will boil to the top and anything that has reached the surface already will only continue to grow. Teams will need to find ways to ensure that their individual drivers stay content in the role they’ve been given. Otherwise, teams that could play a starring role in this season could falter and the constructors below them could surprisingly break through.
4. Further Effects of the Spending Cap
The budget cap, established at £106 million ($135 million) per team, imposes restrictions on the financial resources teams can allocate to the development and construction of their cars. Prior to its implementation in 2021, the leading teams in the league had the freedom to spend amounts far exceeding this limit. This was a huge problem for Formula One, as many teams that had the money to spend would remain near the top. Innately, the teams with lower budgets would consistently finish in the lower places.
With this spending cap, teams are working under the same parameters, leveling the playing field to something much more “fair” than it had been in the past. While some believe that if you have the money to spend then it should be able to be spent, positive effects of this cap have been seen within the past few seasons far more than negative effects (if any).
Split-times in the midfield have become closer and closer and the midfield pack has also been able to close the gap between itself and the consistent front-runners. This is important in creating an atmosphere of pure competitive nature. Historically low-finishing drivers and constructors being given the confidence to try and run with the best helps to create a much more interesting product year in and year out. While these changes may be difficult to see on race day, qualifying times showcase just how close it has gotten for so many drivers. Looking at the end of last season, the gap between Verstappen’s leading qualifying time and Zhou Guanyu, the slowest runner in the first phase, was less than a second.
5. Unprecedented Schedule
This season’s F1 calendar is its biggest in history, seeing a record-breaking 24-race campaign coupled with 6 sprint races along the way. The teams will travel to 24 separate venues, with the Chinese Grand Prix returning after a four-year break due to Covid-19. The ever-popular Shanghai International Circuit will be the first to host one of six sprint races. Further sprints will be coming from Miami, set to be selected for the first time, Brazil as it prepares to host its fourth, Austria for its third, and both Austin and Qatar for their second. This new, longer F1 calendar should make for some fantastic racing across the course of the season.
Bonus: Lewis Hamilton to Ferrari
While this sixth “bonus” point won’t come into effect until the 2025 season, this monumental move from the sport’s biggest icon to a team synonymous with the racing series itself will play a major role in how the rest of the field prepares for the following campaign. A massive driver shake-up at the end of the season was already expected, however, this shock switch will only add fuel to an already tremendous flame. Carlos Sainz, the expected displaced driver from Ferrari, will be looking to find a team suitable for his large ambition in the sport. Meanwhile, the gaping hole Hamilton will leave behind in his seat at Mercedes may prove near-impossible to fill.
Drivers will have to dig in for a long, difficult campaign ahead with so many factors all coming to a head at once. The added pressure of closer times in the field, contracts winding down, and an extra racing weekend should ensure that this is an all-time Formula One season.
