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dear-ao3 · 9 months ago

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iTS LIGHTS OUT AND AWAY WE GO!!! for the first race weekend of the 2024 year, the bahrain gp, hello everyone it’s saph here to take you through the nonsense on this lovely march 4, 2024.

starting with the "resolution" of the christian horner fiasco

and i say resolution but not much has been resolved. see the internal investigation came to a close on february 28th (one day before the official start of the season) and it was announced that he was cleared of all accusations.

a great many people, including several other team principals, were not happy with this because of the implications that the female employees case was seemingly ignored, which makes this sport sexist and all of the stuff that comes along with that. people thought that red bull should have been more open and transparent about the case and the investigation and all that.

now i have a pretty close friend who works in employment law who has been following this case, and this is what she had to say about it:

essentially: internal affairs investigations are supposed to be kept quiet. leaking shit will only hurt people, especially the worker who submitted it. we dont even know what the investigation is about. speculation is not a good policy to have with this many untrustworthy sources. also, legally speaking, just bc someone is a dick doesnt mean they broke the law. horner being a weirdo and a massive asshole DOES NOT equate him breaking the law. stay tuned but dont believe anything at face value. also, dont trust leaked images, all sorts of things can get ai-ed/photoshopped. just be wary and don't only believe rumors. that being said, with this much money and fame being involved, id always believe the victim unless proven otherwise. it just gets very blurry when we dont even know what the investigation is about.

so basically. until we actually know What he was accused of, all of this speculation about what it is and what it isn’t is kinda pointless. cause remember, literally everything about this case has been unconfirmed and mostly rumors. we know that he was accused of Something involving supposed Inappropriate Behavior by a female employee wishing to remain anonymous. that’s it.

and of course sometimes people dont get the justice they deserve from cases like this, which is absolutely wrong, because companies and everyone want to save face. but let’s remember who red bull are for a moment:

red bull is an energy drink company. they are not a car company. horner said himself that the team is just a means of advertising for them and should they start to suck or not be profitable or anything like that, they’re going to get ixed. so this goes very beyond formula 1, it’s the whole red bull brand, all of their followers, shareholders, partners, wverything. and this isn’t even the only athlete team or athletes that red bull sponsors. it’s one of the larger ones for sure but they also sponsor quite possibly every kind of athlete that exists, including badminton, cliff diving, parkour, snow mobile racing, skateboarding, gaming, biking, skiing, wakeboarding etc etc etc. and if they’re only keeping the f1 team if they’re giving them positive press, then it would absolutely not look good for them to keep horner in his position if people are adamant that he did Something that justifies him being dismissed from the team. not just for the f1 team, but for the brand as a whole. if horner did do whatever he was accused of, it would absolutely hurt red bull more at this point to keep him in his position than it would to remove him.

the other team principals on the grid, mostly toto and also zak, have spoken out and said that they would appreciate some more information because this is a big case that has huge implications for the sport and If horner Did do something, then he should be removed. which is absolutely correct of them.

which leads us into the next batch of drama. because of course it isn't over yet.

following the investigation coming to a close, someone emailed a google drive folder full of supposed evidence against horner to journalists, team principals, people in the fia, etc from an anonymous email address. mean girls burn book style.

no one has proof that what the folder contained was real actual evidence. mostly because there were some screenshots that circulated of it online but those were clearly fake ai generated texts and also people who did receive the email have been told that they will be sued if they publish it.

now this is likely because:

the female employee wanted to be anonymous and this, if real, reveals her identity

its an internal investigation, not a public one therefore none of this information is public knowledge

horner missed practice three though on friday to meet with the fia about this supposed google drive of information and we dont know what was said about it but he did come back to the paddock afterwards and was smiling and was there for the race and all that.

bottom line tho is that. assuming horner did nothing (which at this point, we really dont know) unfortunately you can be an asshole but not have broken the law. and while it seems like that might have been what happened (according to the outcome of the investigation), because of the nature of this sport, it is likely to get all kinds of blown out of proportion and destroy horner and possibly red bull.

and that is exactly what has happened.

of course this topic came up during the race weekend. max was apparently asked about it and straight up refused to comment (fair of him). he was even asked by the president of the fia to publicly back horner to put all the drama to an end, but he still has not publicly backed him. (also the current fia president mohammed ben sulayem is under investigation for interfering with an F1 race after he supposedly helped to get fernando's time penalty overturned in jeddah 2023, so whos to say if hes really the most reliable person at this point in time). but the far more interesting bit came from max's father.

thats right, were back at jos verstappen.

because while max has been pretty silent on this whole situation, jos has Not.

jos is apparently displeased with the whole horner situation. probably because jos just wants max to win. and this drama is distracting everyone at red bull and has the potential to destroy everyone there's reputation. reportedly he said that the team could "explode" and its "in danger of being torn apart" if horner stays. he also thinks that horner is playing the vicitim. he also reportedly said that if horner stays then max will not stay.

and max, as far as everyone is concerned, basically is red bull. that team exists For Him at this point. (just like how mercedes existed For hamilton)

lets also take a second to remember here that there was some speculation that either jos or someone from max's team leaked the horner information initially to the press.

following this statement, jos was seen talking with none other than toto wolff in the paddock this weekend.

yes.

that toto wolff.

the mercedes team principal toto wolff.

the same toto wolff who has, unexpectedly, a seat open on his team for 2025.

this is hilarious for several reasons. among them the fact that red bull and merc have been engaged in a cutthroat battle for the drivers championship for the last few years and also because toto and christian seem to despise eachother in ways that couldn't even be solved by a 500k enemies to lovers lowborn (tho according to their wives theyre friends??)

reguardless. jos was very much seen talking to toto. and apparently toto was asked about the possibility of max joining mercedes in 2025. and he reportedly said "anything is possible."

now you might be thinking. isn't max tied down at red bull until 2028? yes, technically he is. however, hemlut marko apparently confirmed that max has an exit clause in his contract (as most drivers do) it was hard to find an exact quote as to What this clause is. aparently marko told this to a german tv station? show? something of that nature? but the translation was something along the lines of "If we are not in a position to provide him with a car that is capable of winning…of course he's interested in success as a racing driver. You don't get any younger... And if he doesn't see the light with Red Bull and these criteria come into play, then it's quite clear that he'll look around. But where would there be something better?" at mercedes, apparently.

marko also reportedly said that he will not get in max's way if he wants to leave.

theres also been some speculation that other instrumental people to red bull will leave if christian stays, among them adrian newey, the technical mastermind behind the car.

so really. quite literally. anything is possible here.

its distinctly possible that jos was talking to toto just to light a fire at red bull to make them realize that Hey You Can Lose Your Driver, but whos to say.

and you might think that that is it. but it is not. unfortunately.

as i mentioned a few posts ago, red bull is changing engine manufactures next year from honda to ford. and ford, as we know has been royally pissed off at this whole ordeal. and aparently, they are seeing if they can get out of the agreement they already have with red bull. because they really want zero part of this drama. so red bull could be out of a driver, a team principal, half of their team, and an engine.

TLDR: no one really knows if horner Did Anything, and even though hes technically been cleared the case itself has damaged the reputation of the team and there are a whole lot of people who want him gone because it it. but red bull are not getting rid of him Yet.

(in a weird way this is good cause its unfortunately refreshing to see a whole lot of rich guys be like hey y'all maybe we shouldn't have a guy who is rumored to be behaving inappropriately with women in charge of our team. silver lining i guess?)

anyway

moving on from that mess

the race!

so a quick refresher on the format of a race weekend for anyone who needs it:

it takes place over three days, first day is 2 practice rounds, second day is a practice round and then qualifying and then the third day is the race. (this is the standard format, its different for sprint weekends) the practice rounds teams generally use to figure out set ups and work through any upgrades they may have added to their cars, qualifying determines what position you start in for the race and then the race is the race. for this one, im not going to divide it up by day, but just so you know what im referencing.

again, reminder, i listen to the f1 tv international broadcast so thats where all my info is coming from. and i know ive mentioned it before,. but damn. the commentary is largely unhinged.

briefly, lets meet the commentators:

david croft (crofty), hangs out in the commentary box, makes werid pop culture references, tangents left right and center, says the infamous "its lights out and away we go!!"

martin brundle, also hangs out in the commentary box with crofty. more subdued than crofty but will also get in on the unhinged drama.

ted kravitz, hangs out in the pit lane. by hangs out i mean that he runs around the pitlane with his microphone trying to get a peek at what the cars are doing when they come in the pits and then usually gets interrupted by the commentators talking about a team radio

its quite the trio

oh and we got the official intro for the year. it wont let me link it but google it if you want. last years was better.

many teams had issues in practice. now i didnt watch the third practice session mostly because i forgot about it, but i didnt see anything too insane that happened during it so im just going to talk about practice 1 and 2, qualifying and the race.

and look. we all knew it was going to happen, so lets just get it out of the way. max verstappen won the 2024 bahrain grand prix. by about 22.5 seconds. which, by formula 1 standards, is a whole fucking lot. and its also just about the same gap that max had to the rest of the grid at the end of last year.

this was entirely, absolutely expected. so much so that one of the commentators said during practice 1 that "everyone in the paddock spent all day yesterday and all day today telling me how they think that red bull are going to blitz it”

coincidentally, the one team who didnt think that red bull was going to blitz it was red bull themselves.

during the practice sessions max complained pretty relentlessly about the shifting of the car. he said over the radio that the car was "literally jumping" and the car seemed to better on long race runs than one single lap (which matters for qualifying cause qualifying you want to go as fast as humanly possible for one lap only). still, at the end of practice two, max was .5 of s second behind lewis hamilton (though there was speculation from zak brown that mercedes had turned up their engine power and red bull had not. this turned out to be true.) regardless of all this, max did say over the radio that "everything is miles off" and the announcers were like "??? is this psychological warfare for other teams??? cause theyre kind of doing good???"

he didnt think that he was going to do well in qualifying either, he did his flying lap and straight up told his race engineer (gp) thats not good enough for pole! and then it was. and then he had to apologize. and then he ended up winning. his teammate perez even ended up finishing p2 as well. who would have thunk!!!

(literally everyone thunk this)

by lap 17 max was already 30 seconds ahead of everyone. absolutely insane in a sport where cars are usually milliseconds away from eachother.

anyway. moving on from that and pivoting to one of the poorest little meow meows of the race: mr charles leclerc, the slutty soup can waist himself.

all weekend this man bashed ferraris tire strategy. all weekend. and it was absolutely refreshing to hear. it started in qualifying.

qualifying is three rounds. first round (q1) 18 minutes, everyone goes out and tries to set the absolute fastest lap that they can. the bottom 5 people get knocked out. q2 is 15 minutes and the remaining 15 cars go out again to set the fastest lap they can and the bottom 5 get knocked out. q1 is then 15 minutes and its the top 10 cars fighting it out for the fastest time. the order that all the cars finish in is the order that they start on the grid the next day for the race. so, you want to be closer to the front because its less cars to overtake.

so charles was in q1, and he had to set a lap time fast enough that he wouldnt be cut. he was in p6, and through to the next round pending anything bonkers, with about 7 minutes left when ferrari sent him out on a brand new set of soft tires to set a faster lap.

now anyone with brain cells would have thought hm. theres a very good chance charles is going to get through to q2 with this time. we dont need to send him out on New Tires, we can probably get away with sending him out on Used Tires. (the newer the soft tires are the better they grip and the faster you go). this would have allowed them to save a set of new soft tires for q3 where it mattered the most (getting pole position).

so leclerc is going out again in q3 on a new set of softs and he says over the radio "i am not happy with this." which, same.

by some miracle, ferrari actually listened to him and pitted him to save the tires.

in q2 charles set a time of 1:29.165 which was the fastest time of the session. in q3 he set a time of 1:29.407, putting him in p2 for the start of the race. this was disappointing, especially because max verstappen, who was on pole position, went 1:29.179. a whole .013 of a second slower than charles did in q2. so if Ferrari had actually saved those brand new softs and not had charles drive on them at all, its very likely he could have had the slight advantage he needed to get pole position.

so in addition to having to start p2, charles's brakes also decided to stop working for about 30 laps of the race. his tires kept locking up and at one point he said over the radio that “my car is fully going to the right when i am breaking, i can’t fight this this is fucking dangerous." eventually the tires sorted themselves out but there was apparently a 100 degree difference between his front tires. charles ended up finishing in fourth. and in his post race interview he said that “we made a step forward but i struggle to see the positives at the end of the weekend” oof.

this was entirely the opposite experience of his teammate, one carlos sainz jr.

now carlos, as we all know, is very much out of a contract at ferrari for next year because hes getting replaced by sir lewis hamilton. and carlos, it would seem, has taken this opportunity to choose violence.

sometimes teams elect to do a driver swap during a race. this is where they have the two cars for their team right next to eachother and the car in front has to let the one behind pass, usually because the car behind has better pace and will have a better shot at overtaking the cars in front.

so charles started the race in front of carlos. charles started second and carlos started fourth. by lap 9 carlos said over team radio that he thought he was faster than the cars (charles) in front of him. and on lap 11 he overtook charles.

there were no orders to do a driver swap. he just did it.

and then he did it again on lap 17.

the only suffering that carlos did at all during the race was because of, to no one's surprise, ferrari's tire strategy. he was running in third place for a good chunk of the race, about 3 seconds off of checo in second. and he asked around lap 44 when the team expected that the hard tires (which was what carlos was racing on) would be faster than the soft tires (what checo was racing on). ferrari's answer was basically around where they were in the race at that point. this, unexpectedly, was not the case. the gap between checo and carlos kept getting bigger, but carlos did manage to take third. and he was very very pleased with the car and the race pace.

and there were several shots of his team not being there when he got out of the car at the end. which they usually are. interesting.

regardless. we are here for carlos's villain arc.

moving on to mercedes. hamilton topped the time sheet in practice 2 (likely cause the engine had been turned up) and they seemed "happy with the balance and the pace of the car" meaning it was doing what they wanted it to (this kind of went out the window headfirst slide into cooperstown on a bad bet later on but well get there). the car did seem to almost light on fire at one point? the announcers had a lovely little field day with this and called it a "lingering flame" which then devolved into a conversation about romantic gestures?? regardless they sent our boy ted to investigate, saying "ted knows everything" and ted went on a long long rant about mercedes specs and then sighed deeply and was like "yeah ill investigate" (ted is basically the friend who you give a first name and a vague description to and they come back with every instagram handle they've ever had and their social security number) aside from that, merc looked good in testing and it was wonderful to see lewis hamilton back on the fucking top babyyy. crofty went as far as to say that "lewis is going be super motivated to remind mercedes what theyre going to miss" which is. damn.

but, basically all this went out the window at the race.

in qualifying, george managed to get p2 and hamilton got p9. which is. not great. especially because they topped the time tables in practice 2.

it all got even worse during the race. somehow.

george's engine decided that it didnt want to work. hamilton's car was stuck on low battery and then his seat broke on lap 25. they both finished the race, but in a disappointing fifth for george and seventh for hamilton. it was widely regarded that they basically needed to go back to the drawing board and see what the hell happened.

speaking of teams with problems. we have williams.

williams, as we know, had problems in testing. and apparently their parts all arrived late, so the construction of the car was started late and they still may be short on extra parts (not good). williams though did introduce a new steering wheel for this year, which was highly anticipated. and then sucked.

logan qualified p18 and alex qualified p13. which is decent for them. during the race logan had managed 3 overtakes before his tires locked up on lap 10 and he spun out into the gravel. he was fortunately able to save it and stay out on track, but he did get lapped twice by max verstappen and finished in dead last place. this was apparently due to a steering wheel problem

williams had to come out and make several statements that it was not logans fault that he did so badly, it was the car, after the terrible season logan had last year.

alex albon on the same hand also had problems. his car's steering wheel also decided to not work. at one point the display on the steering wheel read "car too hot" and alex could change the settings that his race engineer asked him to over the radio. all in all a bit of a hot mess for williams. alex finished p15 and logan finished p20.

rounding out the absolute disaster cars we have alpine.

this is absolutely not a surprise. the car is heavily rumored to be 10 kilos over weight and they were consistently at the back. estie bestie went on the radio saying that the car was "super inconsistent" at the moment during practice and i think it was during qualifying? the car overheated so much that they had to have other teams come help them cool it in the pit lane. not great.

it was so not great that their technical director and head of aerodynamics resigned. during the weekend. not looking great for alpine.

reguardless it was to no ones surprise they were right at the back of the grid. after qualifying a whopping p19 and p20 (behind williams, sauber AND haas!!) they finished the race p17 and p18. you might think that this is good. it is not. the only reason they weren't dead fucking last was because logan sargeant ended up super behind everyone when he spun out and valtteri bottas had a fucked up, minute long pit stop (usually pit stops are 2.5-3 seconds).

at the post race show, jack doohan (alpine's test and reserve driver) was talking with will buxton and jolyon palmer and upon will saying that "alpine had a horror show" jack said that "it was never going to be looking particularly amazing...all in all we finished the race." OOF

and then some teams didnt have problems with their cars, but they did have problems with their drivers.

like RB. racing bulls. visa cashapp venmo PayPal zelle whatever you wanna call them.

in practice one they were one of the only teams to use the soft tires, meaning they went very fast and also meaning that they managed to get one daniel ricciardo to finish that session in p1. which was fantastic to see. he was half a second faster than max. it was great. put him in a red bull.

daniel and yuki both got out in q2 of qualifying with yuki starting p11 and daniel starting p14. they did pretty decent down in the mid field, which was actually quite close.

until. lap 52.

daniel was on the soft tires and yuki was on the hard tires. as we know the soft tires go faster than the hard tires. and daniel was behind yuki. yuki was p13 and daniel was p14. they were decently close to kevin magnussen, who was in p12. but daniel seemingly had more pace than yuki did so the team called for a driver swap to maximize the results of the race.

its important to note here that they were not in the points. they were night fighting for points, they were fighting for positions which is just for like team stats.

yuki was absolutely pissed about the driver swap. he said "are you kidding me, now???" and basically refused to swap with daniel for a whole lap. he did finally let daniel through but it was a little too late and daniel was not able to overtake magnussen by the end of the race. since they were not fighting for points (all drivers points are counted individually and as a team) they did not elect to swap the cars back (which teams will do sometimes).

yuki was extra pissed about this and basically dive-bombed daniel on the cool down lap at the end of the race, almost giving him damage.

daniel was pretty pissed about this behavior because they were not fighting for points and had he been told to swap back with yuki he would have. also daniel said that he probably could have passed magnussen if yuki had let him through when he had been asked to. daniel also said that this very thing was discussed in their strategy meeting. so yuki knew it was a possibility. daniel ended his interview with a solid "we'll go back and have a meeting and be very mature about it" .... wow.

aside from that. daniel seemed a little disappointed in the car, same as he was doing testing. he said that they did not have enough development over the winter and that they are definitely not a top 5 team yet.

there was one small crash at the beginning of the race where lance stroll boinked into i think it was nico hulkenberg (and yes, lance actually said that he boinked into him in a post race interview). ultimately though it wasnt a bad crash and really didnt impede anyone. nico probably could have had a better finish if he hadn't had that happen. he had somehow made it into q3 of qualifying and started p10. after the little incident he ended p16. lance managed to finish in the points at p10.

lance's teammate fernando finished p9 after a p6 start and was reportedly very happy with the car. though, apparently fernando said in a press conference that he Might retire at the end of this year, hes giving it a few races to decide. but apparently he also was talking about how he feels like he could do racing forever not too long ago, so hes definitely playing some kind of game here and its silly goofy fun!

haas i already kind of touched on but they did remarkably well for haas??? both kevin and nico made it out of q1 in qualifying, which is pretty good for them and while they didnt get any points, they werent dead last. which was pretty good for haas. they might have figured out their tire problems which would be pretty freaking great for them.

stake sauber kick f1 whatever you wanna call it team did decently, apart from valtteri's absolutely fucked up pit stop. zhou said in his post race interview that they definitely dont have the pace, but he is happy about the pace that they did have because they had been pretty aggressive with the development of their car and they absolutely need to work on the pit stops.

and mclaren. they were good. pretty good. thats about that. they seem to have about the amount of pace that they thought that they would, but they are anticipating upgrades around race 4 or 5 which is when it will probably get zoom zoom fast. the commentators are big fans of the line up (lando and oscar) because oscar will "push lando in all the right ways"

they started p7 and p8 and finished p6 and p8. which, when you remember that last year lando had to pit something insane like 6 times at bahrain because the car kept having problems and that they haven't gotten points in the first race for the last 2 years, this is pretty good. in qualifying lando even broke into the one minute twenty nine second range on used soft tires, which the commentators were quick to notice because that was what red bull was doing on new soft tires. and during the race hamilton said, about the mclarens (who he was stuck between) "these guys are fast mate!"

but most people were quick to point out that the most promising thing to come from mclarens weekend was that lando was actually being positive about the car. usually hes some level of self deprecating to clearly disappointed during interviews but he was weirdly happy about the progress. which leads us all to believe that there is More To Come. woo!

and that about does that.

aside from the race we had some good social media-ing this week

stake sauber whatever you wanna call it seems to have hired an admin who realized that valtteri will do pretty much anything and be funny while doing it because they had him record a whole asmr video

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and we have definitely talked about the mercedes instagram admin before, but i feel the need to reiterate once again that they are the absolute best in the fucking game. they know their audience and they love to clown on everyone tastefully. this week they posted a video of them in detail explaining how they paint the cars (in response to presumably the fact that most of the cars are not painted as much as they used to be) and then had george make a video of him pointing at different parts of the car and going "carbon fibre"

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(the alpine admin commented on this and said "did someone say carbon fibre" cause they were making fun of themselves for this merely weeks ago).

lewis hamilton also revealed that he would steal from toto wolffs chocolate stash. which is hilarious of him.

carlos also gifted charles a chili pepper that a fan crocheted for him so that charles would remember him in their "post teammate era" and charles looked like he wanted to cry

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and what, pray tell, is mclaren up to in the middle of this mess? shenanigans as per usual

well oscar called out alex albon and logan sargeant for calling him out as the worst paddle player in f1 by calling out alex albon as the real worst paddle player in f1

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they also have the absolute ugliest hats known to man, especially when you wear them backwards, as lando seems to be hell bent on doing.

there was also whatever the absolute hell was going on in this interview in the f1tv post race show

youtube

this is not quite nearly everything that happened, but i think its a good chunk. thanks to my sister and katya for helping me compile all my information. and i will see you all next week for the next race!

Sorry i tried to scroll past but, i know nothing about f1 other than max verstappen is fast, my dad doesnt like lewis hamilton, fast car goes in a loop and sometimes expodes. Could you give me a crash course in f1 drama? Im very intrigued. Whats the tea as it were?

a terribly loaded question, but i will do my best. i’ve talked about some of the drama before like the red bull second seat and the chronicles of haas but allow me to briefly try my hand at explaining the nightmare that is the upcoming silly season

under the cut we go

silly season is when the drivers go through contract renewals, extensions and switches. usually it’s confined to the first half of the season (march-july) but it has been known to extend all the way to the last race of the season and they like to switch people around at random sometimes. driver contracts are complex, there’s a lot of money involved and basically You Are The Face Of The Team so if you have a shit season then you make the team look bad. but at the same time you could have a shit season because you have a shit car. it’s sticky stuff.

so. there are only twenty seats in formula 1. 10 teams. each team gets two drivers. (there’s also reserve drivers but we’re not going to get into that). who ends up with a contract is largely up to the teams, they can pull the contract out from under people they can also cut you mid season. they’ve done it before.

of the 20 drivers on the grid, 14 of them have contracts expiring at the end of the year. yes. 14. you see how this could get complicated.

so let’s meet the teams.

red bull racing. they came first this year (and last year) in the championship. like aggressively first. like they won the championship by over 350 points. they are definitely the team to beat. but if you end up with a seat at red bull, you do have to deal with max verstappen being your teammate and he won all but three of the races last year. he’s the golden boy. red bull are also notoriously silly when it comes to contracts and famously swap people mid season who aren’t performing.

mercedes. merc is home to 7 time world champion lewis hamilton and they have won the championship a great many times, though not since 2021. they are kind of in their flop arc and their car the last 2 years has been pretty garbage, but they have still made it work because they were able to come in second last year.

ferrari. god help the poor little meow meows with a ferrari contract. ferrari is a notoriously great team and they’re trying to get back to the top again but their strategy every single time has fallen short. to the point where their drivers are the ones doing the strategy in their cars while driving. they came in third last year and have been decently consistent at getting first in qualifying and then getting beat by max verstappen on race day.

mclaren. they’ve definitely worked their way up over recent years. they ended fourth last year and have had some championship wins before but not nearly as many as say merc and ferrari. their team ceo (owner? director?) is a little interesting and their car started out a pile of flaming hot garbage at the beginning of the year but they did manage to get their shit together.

aston martin. they are owned by canadian billionaire lawrence stroll, father of lance stroll (one of the drivers for the team). they’ve undergone several name changes over the recent years (force india, racing point, etc). they positively slayed at the start of the season and then one day they sucked. they finished fifth in the championship.

alpine. the frenchest french team. they’re (i think?) still partially owned by the french government. both of their drivers are french. (their drivers also hate eachother but we’ll get to that. just know they’re in the middle of a modern french civil war). they had the opportunity to have a good rookie driver (oscar piastri) this past year but in a thrilling twitter battle, he publically flamed the shit out of them and went to mclaren instead (and slayed). they're usually solidly middle of the pack. they ended sixth in the championship.

williams. williams has been one of the back of the grid teams for the last many years but they have finally started to get their shit together and don’t quite suck as much as they used to. all of the points this year were scored by only one driver though (except one but we’ll get there). they came in seventh.

alpha tauri. they are the sister team of red bull. so technically redbull owns both teams (meaning they can swap drivers between teams. they like doing this.) they’ve just kind of been There for awhile but they did slay towards the end of the season when one of their drivers led the race for several laps. basically tho, this team is the gateway to redbull. they came in eighth.

alpha romeo. recently renamed to stake f1 team (but sometimes they are going to be called kick sauber. this is a whole other drama post and i’m not getting into it). they’re also just kind of there. generally unproblematic. seems that really great drivers who get ixed out of a contract for a younger driver end up here or young drivers who are in their early years are here before they go to a better team. they ended ninth this year.

haas. oh haas. goofy team. they suck. point blank they suck. they keep loosing sponsors because they suck, they don’t win ever (one time they came first in qualifying last year). they cursed themselves in australia in 2018 by not tightening their tires and its been downhill ever since. they came 10th. their team principle got let go (fired?) who’s to say today.

so those are the teams. it is important to note that:

-there is a cost cap. each team is allowed to spend no more than 135m per year.

-not all cars are equal. some things are standard. they all undergo the same testing. but the cars are all very different. so you can be a good driver but stuck in a shitty car. which makes it impressive if you are doing well in a shitty car.

let’s meet our drivers!!!

starting with the guys who’s contract is not ending in 2024:

max verstappen. 3 time world champion. 26 years old. general beast on the track. he dominated the whole season. he’s currently racing for red bull and has a contract with them through 2028.

lewis hamilton. 7 time world champion. 39 years old. he drives for mercedes. he will not leave mercedes until he retires. he really really wants to win an 8th world championship and is willing to stick it out a few more years as long as merc still believes in him. his contract expires in 2025.

george russell. the other merc driver. 26 years old. hes aggressively british and says thinks like blimey unironically. walking meme. got his merc seat in 2022 right when they entered their flop arc by getting his tractor of a williams to finish second in qualifying in the middle of a rainstorm. his contract expires in 2025.

lando norris. mclaren driver. 24 years old. he has notably never won a race in his five years of formula one (mostly because right when his car finally was good enough max verstappen was 20 seconds ahead of anyone) but he is regarded as Very Good. he has only ever driven for mclaren. and even though there is another year left on his contract there is mass speculation that he will not renew his contract with mclaren after it expires and he may move up to one of the top teams (red bull, merc, ferrari) (tho i think he doesnt hate himself quite enough to go to ferrari). his contract expires in 2025.

oscar piastri. the other mclaren driver. 22 years old. this was his rookie season and he positively slayed. like people compared his rookie season to lewis hamiltons rookie season. he also had the positively funniest start to his rookie year because alpine announced that he would be driving for them (he had been their reserve driver and in the alpine academy) and he posted a tweet that basically said yeah thats false i never singed anything with you and im going to race with mclaren instead (he dodged a bullet) and then alpine tried and failed to sue him for $4m USD. he signed a contract extension with mclaren this year and his contract expires in 2026.

lance stroll. aston martin driver and son of the aston martin owner. hes doing ok, tho there was conspiracy that he wanted to quit and have a tennis career awhile ago. but basically since his dad owns the team it seems that hes guaranteed a seat for as long as he wants one.

so now. moving onto the good shit. the people who have contracts expiring in 2024. hold onto your hats people.

charles leclerc. (everyones favorite slutty little soup can). 26 years old. he is currently at ferrari and he has been since 2019. notably, he was given the longest contract in the history of ferrari after a stellar rookie season at sauber (renamed to alpha romeo, renamed to stake f1) where he got the tractor of a car consistently into the points. having the longest contract in the history of ferrari was a flex at the time, but now its likely how he will introduce himself at therapy sessions. ferrari have fucked this man left right and center up the ass with a plastic lunchroom spork. hes talented, he can drive, and he can drive well. but the strategy that ferrari has absolutely sucks. either something is wrong with the car (see him blowing out his gear box on the formation lap in monaco, his car completely crapping out and spinning into the barrier in brazil before the race even started) or they fuck up his pit stops or put him on the wrong tires and honestly its just frustrating. but will he leave??? likely not. you'd have to pry ferrari out of his cold dead hands and at this rate that might be where this is headed though there has been some minor speculation of him going to another team like merc or red bull, but merc doesnt have any open seats and red bull is a whole other dumpster fire of drama. ferrari are going to have to pay him a boatload of money to make him stay.

carlos sainz. the smooth operator. 29 years old. ferrari driver. previously carlos was at toro rosso (renamed to alpha tauri), renault (renamed to alpine), and mclaren before signing with ferrari. he has been at ferrari since 2021 and has voiced that he would like to stay with them for however long he can. there is speculation that lando might replace him at ferrari (but landos contract is not up until 2025) and there is also some speculation that alex albon might replace him. while charles is clearly the golden boy at ferrari, carlos is slightly slower but also definitely consistent. he was THE ONLY non red bull driver to win a race this past year, in Singapore after max verstappedn was knocked out of qualifying by alpha tauri reserve driver liam lawson (more on him later) and because he basically came up with his own strategy in the car while he was driving.

sergio perez. aka checo. red bull driver. 33 years old. and oh boy here's where we open the can of worms. checo was previously at racing point (renamed aston martin) and it was very near the end of the 2020 (?) season and he was out of a contract. he had a bonkers race where he was knocked to the back of the grid and then overtook everyone and somehow ended up winning (there is more to that story but just trust me) and christian horner, red bull team principle, mr ginger spice and definite disney villain called him and said congrats sir you have a seat at red bull! well. fast forward. hes been causing problems. problems as in crashing a lot, generally not doing great and pissing the crap out of red bull. it is basically guaranteed at this point that he will not be getting a contract extension. there was actually talk this year of him losing his seat mid season to one of the alpha tauri drivers, because remember, red bull owns both teams and they can switch them whenever they want to (and they have!) but ultimately this did not happen. even though checo has a seat at red bull until the end of 2024, its mass speculated that he is going to get switched with an alpha tauri driver, probably daniel ricciardo (more on him shortly) mid season because there is a speculated clause in daniels contract that says that if checo isn't performing well in the first few races daniel is getting his seat.

daniel ricciardo. 34 years old. alpha tauri driver. man oh man what a guy. outside of being the prankster of the paddock, he has one of the most batshit careers of anyone currently on the grid. he started out at red bull and was showing real talent and skill and was on track to win things (and was!) and was there until the end of 2018 when max verstappen (his teammate) started getting preferential treatment and also red bull started having a lot of problems with their engines (which were being outsourced from Renault (now alpine) and another team on the grid) and well very very long story short he made the surprise move of the century and decided to sign with Renault (which makes no sense they're the one with the engine problems) and was there for 2 years before moving again to mclaren where he was reportedly not treated very well and had a hard time driving the car so they mutually ended his contract with them early and he basically retired at the end of the 2022 season and became a red bull reserve driver. then halfway through the 2023 season alpha tauri ixed one of their drivers, nyck de vries, because he wasnt doing well and promoted daniel back up to a full time driver at alpha tauri (which we know is only a step down from red bull) but then he broke his hand in a crash in zanvort (?) and then he was replaced for a few races by formula 2 driver liam lawson (who we will also talk about) and then he came back to finish out the season in alpha tauri after he was cleared. daniel has admitted openly that he never should have left red bull and he was given bad advice to do so. hes towards the end of his career at this point and its well known that he Really Really wants to finish out his career at red bull again. he and max have already been teammates before and they do work well together and daniel is great driver (see his comeback in texas (or maybe it was brazil?) this year). so. Pretty Sure that daniels going to get either an extension at alpha tauri or go up to red bull. thats what we all want. get this man in a red bull we need him there biblically.

liam lawson. now technically liam is not actually a formula 1 driver. hes a formula 2 driver, but he was daniels replacement for five races and there has been some speculation and some confirmed news about him so hes getting included. when he was racing for f1 he was at alpha tauri. hes 21 and looks like he belongs in the movie grease. no one was expecting him to slay in formula 1 and he positively knocked everyones socks off. the scene: Singapore. which, if you'll recall, is the one race that a not red bull driver won. this was largely because liam lawson slayed the absolute game in qualifying. the qualifying part of racing determines what order the cars start in on the grid for the race and theres three parts, the first two parts the bottom 5 drivers each time get knocked out and then the top 10 complete for the last 10 spots. liam lawson knocked BOTH max verstappen and checo perez out of qualifying in the second round by going very slightly faster than them, effectively fucking up red bulls race and allowing carlos to win. and he also scored points in that race, which no one was expecting. now thats all fine and dandy, but here's the speculation: hemlut marko (im pretty sure) (who is somehow decently involved in the decision making at red bull though i couldn't tell you how) said that he thinks that liam lawson will be in an f1 seat no later than 2025. meaning that he will probably get offered a contract this year. and hes already raced for alpha tauri. red bull have sunk a good amount of money into him. they clearly want him. so if he gets offered an alpha tauri seat in 2025, that means theres a good chance danny rics is going to red bull. do you SEE how the plot here is THICKENED

yuki tsunoda. age 23. currently at alpha tauri. and fun fact, the only alpha tauri driver to race there the whole year. he had three separate team mates. he is slaying and hes often slept on. he has a bit of a temper and likes to shout on the radio and also hates working out (they had to force him to move to italy or something to work out, long story) but hes been kinda killing it. he led several laps in the abu dhabi race this year and hes decently consistent. people think theres possibility that he could get moved up to red bull on account of the fact that he is younger than daniel and clearly has more years in him,, but there is also possibility that he might not because red bull like to make stupid decisions. and if he doesnt get moved up to rebel, will he stay with alpha tauri? we don't know.

alex albon. age 27. currently a williams driver. alex albon is another one with a batshit career. he started out his rookie year in 2019 at alpha tauri then got moved up to red bull halfway through the year when red bull decided that pierre gasley wasnt doing a good enough job (more on him later) and stayed with red bull for a solid year and a half until he lost his seat in 2021 to checo. he has been with williams for the last two years and is basically carrying the team. like. williams as a team scored 28 points this year. and alex albon scored 27 of those 28 points. and as we know, williams is still kind of in their shit arc (though they are doing much better. they didnt score any points for a solid 2 (?) years. so this is an improvement.) and if you can get a shit car to perform you catch the eye of bigger teams. now, alex has already been a red bull driver. and he was on the cusp of podiuming two separate times when lewis hamilton ran into him. this (among a few other things) basically killed his chances at getting resigned at red bull because he wasnt ""performing"" and red bull are bitches who love to win. but some people think that red bull should give him another shot. like daniel, hes already been max's teammate and he can definitely drive. but theres also talk he might go to ferrari because ferrari think that he might compliment charles's driving style (or something). but going to ferrari at this point is kind of suicide. so.

logan sergeant. age 23. the only american on the grid. the other williams driver. he just finished his rookie year. he scored a grand total of one single point this season, in texas, and it was because charles leclerc and lewis hamilton both got disqualified because the floor of their car had more wear (by literally less than millimeters) than it was allowed to, bumping him up from 12th to 10th. he has never done better than alex albon. he was also the very last driver to get a contract for 2024, with williams waiting until i think december of 2023 to announce his contract extension. clearly, hes on thin ice. but people have also said that he needs time to get used to formula 1 (other people have pointed out that oscar piastri slayed his rookie season this year and this statement about needing time is largely false). where logan ends up next year though will largely depend on how well the 2024 season goes for him.

fernando alonso. 42 years old. many people like to point out that oscar piastri is actually younger than fernando's racing career. he won tiktok creator of the year (somehow) and is also a 2 time world champion. he retired a few years ago, just to show back up again and slay. during the first half of the season when aston martin had a zoom zoom car he killed it, and then they had problems on top of problems and he didnt do well. except for that one race in brazil where he came in third, beating checo by literally .05 seconds. he hasn't really made any hints about retiring a second time and he is kind of carrying aston Martin right now (he scored 205 points this season, coming in 4th and tying in points with charles leclerc, lance stroll only scored 74 points this year.) and they did have their best year yet this year. (though they are relatively new).

pierre gasley. 27 years old. french. drives for alpine. the french team. previously he raced with toro rosso (now alpha tauri), then got promoted to a red bull driver in 2019, then halfway through the season they decided he wasnt doing a good enough job and he got demoted back down to alpha tauri. then he won a race with alpha tauri just to stick it to red bull. after the great oscar piastri contract twitter war, he was signed as alpines second driver, with Esteban ocon being the other driver (more on him soon). estie bestie and pierre (both french) were childhood friends and now hate each other for unknown reasons and basically feuded on the track for most of the season. french civil war at alpine. he scored 62 points in 2023 and came in 11th. not really sure where he will end up, it is possible that he will stick it out at alpine.

esteban ocon. 27 years old. also french. currently driving for alpine. another one with a silly bonkers career. he started out at force india and had a baller few seasons there but his teammate at the time was checo, and checo didnt really cooperate with him too much and caused some drama that cost estie bestie some places and some points. max verstappen also beat him up in the garage once. thats not really relevant but it did happen. anyway, after the owner of force india was arrested for .... i don't remember what maybe it was embezzlement or bankruptcy or something money related, the team was backed by lawrence stroll and became racing point. but all of that happened mid season and lawrence was basically like look ill back you guys for now but next year my son gets a seat (lance) so one of you two (checo and estie bestie) have to go. and ultimately they let estie bestie go even though he was more consistent because checo had more sponsors and they needed money. so he was out of formula 1 for a few years (but was a merc reserve driver) and then went to Renault, which then became alpine. he did come in 12th though overall this season, just behind pierre. so. will alpine keep both him and pierre and keep the civil war going? whos to say.

nico hulkenberg. 36 years old. haas driver. in his 200+ f1 races he has never been on the podium and he really really wants to be on the podium. unfortunately this will never happen in a haas because haas fucking sucks. and everyone knows it. he is getting towards the end of his career though. though! stake f1 will become the mario Andretti and audi team in 2026 (don't question it) and they have supposedly voiced interest in nico. so we will see if he hangs on that long to end up at audi. for now tough, hes definitely hating it at haas. though, haas are going to have a different team principle next year so maybe that will change things. i have a sneaky feeling through that haas will probably end up with another 2 rookie drivers because everyone else is smart enough to not race for them.

kevin magnussen. 31 years old. haas driver. hes another deeply interesting character. he has had one podium. in his rookie season. in his first race. and none since. kevin started at haas in 2017 and then left at then end of 2020 when he basically got kicked off because the team needed money and they wanted to bring in drivers with more sponsorships. these drivers were mick schumacher and nikita mazepin. so kevin basically was forced to retire after the 2020 season. this went decently well for haas. until russia invaded ukraine right before the start of the 2022 season and, well, nikita was Russian and it was never distinctly proven that his dads company (who was sponsoring the team) wasnt also funding the invasion. so nikita got fired and they were literally like 2 weeks out from the start of the season, down a driver. who are you gonna call? kevin magnussen! and hes been back ever since. but hes clearly getting annoyed with haas. there was one great clip from this year where his car caught on fire and he kind of just stared into to, clearly hoping it would burn for a long time. so the likelihood of him extending his contract is looking slim.

valtteri bottas. 34 years old. currently a driver for stake f1 (alpha romeo, kick sauber, whatever you wanna call it). previously, he was a mercedes driver and notoriously helped lewis hamilton win a great many championships, until he lost his seat to george russell in 2022. there was a rather awkward part of the 2021 season where valtteri knew that he was out of a merc seat the following year and kind of just chose violence. he slayed. then he went to alpha romeo, grew a mullet and made a calendar of his ass. quite the glow up if you ask me. hes also very interested in cycling. honestly though, i have my own personal speculation that hes going to retire at the end of this year.

zhou guanyu. 24 years old. driver for stake f1 (alpha romeo/kick sauber, etc etc). hes doing alright. he just finished his second season, in his first season he was majorly out qualified by valtteri but this past season he managed to out qualify him a good 6 times. which is decently good for the tractor of a car hes driving. its possible that he could get a contract extension, but like logan, its probably going to depend on how the 2024 season goes for him.

and thats all the drivers. theres also a few others i didnt talk about, like some other f2 drivers who want seats and mick schumacher, who is currently a merc reserve driver, all of which could be contenders for f1 seats. but one things for sure. this is going to be the silliest fucking silly season.

feel free to add on and peer review me

#not a tag #from saph #f1 #saph explains silly season 2024 #red more my little babygirl please work #id like to thank the academy for this one #formula 1 #bahrain gp 2024 #christ this is long #Youtube #probably could have formatted this better but oh well live laugh love #Instagram

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