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Category: Opinions

  • 2024 Season Review – Racing Bulls

    Daniel Ricciardo (AUS) RB VCARB 01. 23.02.2024. Formula 1 Testing, Sakhir, Bahrain, Day Three. – http://www.xpbimages.com, EMail: requests@xpbimages.com © Copyright: Bearne / XPB Images

    Early Changes and Criticism

    Before the 2024 season started Alpha Tauri changed their team name to Visa Before the 2024 season started Alpha Tauri changed their team name to Visa Cash App Racing Bulls, VCARB for short and then just RB. Absolutely ridiculous. The team also came under fire again, from Zak Brown for being Red Bulls “B” team. I kind of feel as though the criticism is a bit harsh and undeserved. If RB we’re up there alongside Red Bull every weekend, then I could understand and you might be able to say that there is a much closer relationship than is allowed but the team is a firm and consistent midfield challenger and have never matched Red Bull on the track so I think it is safe to say they are not really benefiting from any extra relationship with Red Bull.

    There were some early changes for the team with long running Team Principal Frans Tost leaving at the end of 2023. It’s not always ideal to prepare for a season after losing such a long serving figure head. New people come in with new ideas and can upset the apple cart. They did, however, start the season with the same driver line up of Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda. Something which would change after Singapore.

    The Team

    On paper it wasn’t a bad season for the Red Bull Junior team, although they finished in the same position as they did in 2023 (8th), they did score almost double their 2023 tally with Tsunoda scoring the majority of the points. They leap frogged Williams, but also lost ground to Haas. They could have however finished above Alpine, if they hadn’t had a very fruitful Brazilian GP.

    In terms of in-season developments, like most midfield teams there wasn’t too many, however what they did bring, worked and didn’t affect their performance in a negative way too much.

    It’s always hard to judge the midfield teams because they are so closely matched and fight for only a handful of points.

    The Drivers

    We saw what as potentially the end of Daniel Ricciardo’s career as an F1 driver. He was a bit of a conundrum for me really. I have always felt that he ran away from Red Bull and shied away from the challenge of Verstappen. He never really seemed to hit the heights or consistency he had when he was at Red Bull and just as he started discovering some form he ditched Renault for McLaren, which turned out to be a disastrous move and start the beginning of the end for him. He was lucky to return to F1 in 2023, however from the start he was regularly outperformed by Tsunoda.

    Daniel Ricciardo would eventually be replaced by Liam Lawson after the Singapore Grand Prix. He seems to be the chosen one at the moment. For those six the races they had together Lawson out qualified Tsunoda once and didn’t really outshine him in any of the races, with Tsunoda scoring the more points. I personally don’t think Lawson has really done anything to earn the drive at the main Red Bull team, but it will be interesting to see how he gets on.

    For 2025..

    2025 will see Hadjar join Tsunoda. I personally think he will outperform the rookie and so he should. I also have a feeling this will be Tsunoda’s last season at RB, I think he will be looking elsewhere for 2026. The team however need to push on and move forward in that midfield battle, it will be hard however with a rookie. Hadjar needs to find consistency first over speed, else RB might be finding themselves with a lot of repair bills.

    2024 Season Rating 5/10

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  • Should F1 Revise its Point Scoring Positions?

    I was talking to a friend the other day about the point system that is in F1 currently. In this post, we will discuss points for the main race and will ignore the sprint and the point awarded for fastest lap.

    The Current State of Play

    If you don’t know this is the breakdown of the current points scoring positions:

    1st – 256th – 8
    2nd – 187th – 6
    3rd – 158th – 4
    4th – 129th – 2
    5th – 1010th – 1

    Is Anything Changing for 2025?

    In short, no. There was a discussion earlier on in 2024, to increase the points scoring positions from 1st-10th to 1st-12th. However, when it was put to a vote, it was unanimously decided by the F1 Commission to not make any changes.

    What Is My Opinion?

    For 2025 it means that the midfield teams will continue to struggle to make any headway in the championship. Whilst its right to reward success, it’s also right to not reward failure. It’s a hard line to take but let me explain my why I think that way.

    Firstly, I remember watching a Practice Session on Sky and hearing David Croft say he thinks all cars that finish should score points. I don’t agree with this because if all cars finish the race, I do not believe you should reward a driver/ team for finishing dead last. The whole aim of the game in F1 is to push the boundary and try to make your way up that grid. In my opinion if you have point’s all the way down the finishing positions, for me it gives teams less of an incentive to improve and it gives them less of a target to work towards.

    On the flip side however, the reliability of the cars in F1 now, particularly from the top 4 teams is almost bullet proof. I had a quick look through last season’s results and for a large part of the season (save for the odd occasion) the top 8 scoring positions were taken by drivers from Red Bull, McLaren, Ferrari and Mercedes. That means 60% of the F1 grid are fighting for 2-point scoring positions. The reliability in F1 now is the highest it has been for as long as I can remember, and this might partially be down to the way the cars are driven these days. It feels that 90% of races these days are more of a time trial than a race, the drivers are more focused on saving tyres and fuel than they are racing. Obviously, technology has also come a long way since I started watching F1 in 1998 when you’d regularly see engines or gearboxes let go, but I also feel this generation of cars are not pushed to the limit of tolerances as often as they used to be.

    The midfield is so tightly packed that I personally think the points positions should be extended out to 12th or 13th, it would give the teams more fruits for their labour without rewarding someone for finishing last 30seconds behind the car in front and it could also lead to some more interesting battles in the middle of the pack. It’s an interesting topic of conversation and I would love to be able to see what others think. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

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