2024 Formula 1 Preview & Review.

[Fortitude]

Hamilton looks forward to GP in Las Vegas: 'It will be even better than in '23''.
“One of the cool things is, I feel like I maybe play a tiny role in these races that appear," said the Mercedes Briton.
16 Nov 2024
Ludo van Denderen
GPblog.com

The 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix was one that has gone down in the history books. Of course, there were the problems on the opening day, when covers came loose and destroyed Carlos Sainz's Ferrari, for example. Only deep into the night and with no fans could FP2 be completed. But that was offset by a great Grand Prix on Sunday, with Max Verstappen winning.

According to Hamilton, lessons were learned after the first edition. "I think what happened with the fans and I can't remember exactly, but it wasn't the smoothest of weekends, but the race was incredible. And so going back now, I think they would have made so many changes and it would be even better. But yeah, definitely dancing under the nightlights was just incredible."

‘Cool’;

https://www.gpblog.com/en/news/31292...las-vegas.html


Report: Why Mercedes has blocked Lewis Hamilton from taking part in post-season test with Ferrari in Abu Dhabi
13 Nov 2024
Rory Mitchell
F1 Oversteer

With Lewis Hamilton switching to Ferrari for the 2025 season, the possibility of him running for the team in a post-season Abu Dhabi test lingered. Beyond a filming day, a run in a 2025 or 2024 car outside of official tests is forbidden to F1 teams prior to the test in Bahrain next year.

Ferrari had plans to run Hamilton in one of their cars to bed himself in the team before making his full race weekend debut, however, this looks set to be postponed after Mercedes decided to block the seven-time world champion.

According to a report from Autosport, this looks set to happen at the start of next year with an appearance in the Abu Dhabi post-season test also ruled out. This means Ferrari will need to wait until next year when it plans to run him in a 2022 car as part of the ‘Testing of Previous Cars’ rules set out in the regulations.

‘Mercedes has blocked Lewis Hamilton’;

https://www.f1oversteer.com/news/why...-in-abu-dhabi/


Mercedes announce special Lewis Hamilton livery plans for final race together
14 Nov 2024
Jamie Woodhouse
PlanetF1.com

Mercedes are giving fans the chance to have their name on the W15 driven by Lewis Hamilton as he contests his final race with the team. 150 fans to have their name on Mercedes W15 of Lewis Hamilton

‘150 fans’;

https://www.planetf1.com/news/merced...n-names-livery


Mercedes drop hint of what’s next for Valtteri Bottas after Sauber axe
Bottas has been a part of the team since 2022 but will leave at the end of the 2024 season
15 Nov 2024
Brandon Sutton
Total Motorsport

What’s next for Valtteri Bottas? But he may not be out of the sport for long with a move to back to the Silver Arrows potentially on the cards as a reserve and development driver to offer some vital experience and technical input that the 26-year-old Russell and 18-year-old Kimi Antonelli may lack.

And it seems as though the link could be true, as Mercedes drop a cryptic hint on social media of a reunion with the man who helped guide them to five consecutive constructors’ championships between 2017-2021.

‘Mercedes drop hint’;

https://www.total-motorsport.com/f1-...er-sauber-axe/


‘Not good enough’… The moment Toto Wolff felt ‘embarrassment’ as the team principal of Mercedes
12 Nov 2024
Ben Evans
F1 Oversteer

The 2023 Formula 1 season didn’t go to plan for Mercedes and team principal Toto Wolff. After winning the Constructors’ Championship in 2021 but cruelly missing out on helping Lewis Hamilton win his 8th title in Abu Dhabi, Mercedes set about tackling the next era of regulations in F1.

Author Matt Whyman followed the Brackley-based team for his book Inside Mercedes F1 and shared what happened in the briefing after pre-season testing in Bahrain. He shared what Wolff told the team ahead of the campaign and the ‘embarrassment’ he felt when comparing Mercedes’s performance to their rivals.

After pre-season testing, Mercedes are debriefing ahead of the season’s opening race. Hamilton’s race engineer Pete Bonnington said: “It wasn’t long ago that we were kings of winter testing, It feels like we’ve slipped.” Wolff injected and said: “This is just not good enough. We need to feel a certain degree of embarrassment here. We blame the problem not the person, but nevertheless…come on!”

‘Not good enough’;

https://www.f1oversteer.com/news/not...l-of-mercedes/

[Fortitude]

Slow Car Led To Dan Fallows’ Aston Exit.
Dan Fallows lost his job at Aston Martin because of the team’s performance struggles, according to Ralf Schumacher.
Nov 18, 2024
Media
F1 Chronicle

Fallows only started work as the Silverstone-based team’s technical director in 2022, having been poached from the ultra-successful Red Bull. Aston Martin had a meteoric start to the 2023 season, but car development then stalled. The team also started quite strongly this year, but Fernando Alonso now thinks Aston Martin has one of the slowest cars of all.

1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve picked up the theme in conversation with Grosvenor Sport: “It is no surprise that Dan Fallows is leaving Aston Martin, if you look at the development of that car. It just gets worse and worse,” he said. “Fallows left Red Bull to claim this better role, but I can imagine that it was not a good fit between him and Aston Martin. And now Adrian is arriving.”

Schumacher admits he isn’t sure if Newey, who worked closely with Fallows at Red Bull, asked for his former colleague to be ousted. “I don’t know what happened,” said the German, “but I will ask Adrian when I see him next.” Indeed, Schumacher and Newey both often spend time in South Africa along with Eddie Jordan.

‘Slow Car’;

https://f1chronicle.com/slow-car-led.../?nowprocket=1


Aston Martin outline F1 direction after major team restructure
Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack has detailed how the Silverstone squad is addressing the development of its team, outlining a preference for longer-term thinking.
17 Nov 2024
Samuel Coop & Aaron Deckers
RcingNews365

Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack says that re-building the Silverstone squad is a task that must be assessed from a long-term perspective.

When speaking to media including RacingNews365, Krack was asked if the internal structure at Aston Martin had become too complex and if that has led the team from punching above its weight to punching below it. "You have a team to develop, and you have a car team," he replied. "And you must be careful not to mix them too much.”

"When it is the car is very short term. We speak [in] zero to eight, or 10 or 12 weeks; when you develop a team, [it is] maybe months and years. You need to isolate them, not mixing them too much, because very often you can be influenced by a bad result, but also you can be influenced by good results."

‘Re-building’;

https://racingnews365.com/aston-mart...am-restructure


Alonso relentlessly driven by ‘hope’ amid Aston Martin’s struggles
17/11/2024
Phillip van Osten
F1i.com

Fernando Alonso says his belief that his experience and feedback will help Aston Martin turn around its fortunes is the main fuel powering his motivation as his team navigates its way through a difficult period.

Speaking to the media recently, Alonso reflected on what keeps him motivated even when competing for positions far below his aspirations. “It's the hope that is always there,” he said, quoted by Motorsport Week. “Obviously, in terms of positions and efforts, you will say that it's not worth fighting for P12,” he admitted.

“But if that P12 gives the team any insight into what we are missing, if you are fighting with other cars and you see some weaknesses, some strengths, you can feed back to the team and you can improve for the next race or next year.”

‘Relentlessly’;

https://f1i.com/news/524697-alonso-r...struggles.html


How Aston Martin went from podium to slowest in only a year
Nov 17, 2024
Scott Mitchell-Malm
The Race

Few would have imagined, even when the peak of Aston Martin’s stunning podium-laden start to 2023 had long since passed, it would have the slowest Formula 1 car at some point in 2024. Its decline since has been persistent and is best illustrated by having the slowest car at the 2024 Brazilian Grand Prix, just 12 months on from its most recent podium finish - although the reality of that podium was more an opportunistic, well-executed race weekend by Aston Martin and some Fernando Alonso heroics than the car being genuinely that fast by the end of 2023.

But it is important that whatever Aston Martin is able to get right in 2025 doesn’t just repeat the cycle of developing well with a good lead time for a new season and then slipping back once it begins. Especially as 2025 will mark the arrival of two major recruits: Enrico Cardile as chief technical officer and Adrian Newey as technical managing partner.

Such arrivals are the elephants in the room where Fallows is concerned. There are two people already slotting in above where he was in the food chain, and that’s without factoring in Andy Cowell recently arriving as Group CEO and Bob Bell joining earlier in 2024 as executive director - both with much wider remits than the day-to-day technical leadership.

‘Podium to slowest’;

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/a...ear-explained/


After sacking its technical director, Aston Martin is all out of excuses in pursuit of F1 greatness
Nov 15th, 2024
Michael Lamonato
Fox Sports (Australia)

It’s an unusual time for a team to be making big personnel changes with the end of the season so near on the horizon, but Aston Martin has no time to wait.

It’s why it released technical director Dan Fallows, once heralded as a defining acquisition from the clutches of Red Bull Racing, via a no-fuss press release this week with just three rounds to go for the season.

“I would like to thank Dan for his contribution to Aston Martin in the last two years,” Aston Martin group CEO Andy Cowell said in an extremely brief statement. “Dan led the team to the success of the AMR23 which secured eight podiums last season.”

‘Out of excuses’;

https://www.foxsports.com.au/motorsp...8fb7d1222d83a3


Why Fallows' farewell at Aston Martin was already in the air
12 Nov 2024
Ludo van Denderen
GPblog.com

How many captains can you have on the same ship? Aston Martin apparently came to the conclusion that there are now too many bright minds to head the technical departments of the ambitious British team. Dan Fallows has fallen victim to this, with news emerging earlier on Tuesday that the Brit will leave his post as technical director this month.

The departure of Fallows - who will take up another, as yet unknown, position within the Group - is certainly not unexpected. A few months ago, Aston Martin announced that Enrico Cardile was coming over from Ferrari to take up the role of chief technical officer, meaning that Fallows would report directly to the Italian.

Lawrence Stroll, the (co-)owner of the Aston Martin F1 team, has never made a secret of aiming for the highest goals with his team, looking for Grand Prix victories and even championships. Apparently, Fallows was not seen as the man who could bring that next step to the team. The current season did not help his cause either, with a brilliant 2023 season in which Aston Martin seemed a regular on the podium becoming a failed 2024 season, unable to capture a single trophy.

‘Already in the air’;

https://www.gpblog.com/en/news/31249...martin-f1.html


The ‘superteam’ of geniuses Adrian Newey will lead at Aston Martin
Adrian Newey will form part of a 'superteam' technical department when he joins Aston Martin in F1 2025.
12 Nov 2024
Lewis Larkam
Crash.Net

Adrian Newey will work with several esteemed F1 figures when he joins Aston Martin’s technical line-up.
Andy Cowell: One of those is former Mercedes engine mastermind Andy Cowell, who will join Aston Martin as their new group chief executive officer on October 1.

Enrico Cardile Another major coup for Aston Martin was the signing of Enciro Cardile - a key pillar of Ferrari’s F1 technical team.
Bob Bell: The capture of Bob Bell marked another highly experienced signing for Aston Martin after the F1 veteran left his advisory role for the struggling Alpine team earlier this year.

Tom McCullough: Unlike the above arrivals, Tom McCullough has been a core member of Aston Martin’s technical department for years, having initially joined the team under their previous Force India guise a decade ago.
Luca Furbatto: Former Sauber chief designer Luca Furbatto was signed by Aston Martin as their new engineering director ahead of the 2022 season

‘Superteam’;

https://www.crash.net/f1/news/105527...d-aston-martin

[Fortitude]

Jeremy Clarkson delivers free Hawkstone to Alpine F1 team.
And this week he congratulated Mr Gasly in person when he turned up at the team's Enstone headquarters, a few miles from Diddly Squat Farm, with a sports car full of crates of Hawstone.
15 Nov 2024
Miranda Norris
Oxford Mail

Jeremy Clarkson has delivered a fresh batch of beer to the Oxfordshire-based Alpine F1 team to celebrate their success in the Brazilian Grand Prix. French drivers Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly finished second and third respectively in a rain-soaked, chaotic and crash-strewn race in Sao Paulo.

The two drivers scored more than twice as many points as in all their previous 20 races. Alpine is based in Enstone. Mr Clarkson, who lives in nearby Chipping Norton, publicly stated after the race: "Brilliant work from Alpine in Brazil today.

"Fantastic result for the Chipping Norton people." While inspecting cars in the team's HQ, he said: "While the entire Alpine team is distracted by their free Hawkstone beer I thought I'd give their car a new sponsor."

‘Crates of Hawstone’;

https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/24...lpine-f1-team/


Briatore urges underpowered Alpine to field ‘better car’ in 2025
18/11/2024
Phillip van Osten
F1i.com

Alpine executive advisor Flavio Briatore has made clear to the French team that it must develop a significantly improved chassis for 2025 to compensate for its Renault engine’s current three-tenths-per-lap power deficit.

To bridge this gap, Briatore emphasizes the need for a significant improvement in the car's aerodynamic performance and tyre management. “In the wet the discussion relating to engine power is reset, so even in 2025 we will have to make up for these three tenths that we are missing by making a better car,” he told La Gazzetta dello Sport.

“We must not worry because we know that it is like this, and we will have to try to do well using better aerodynamics and studying the tyres. Without feeling sorry for ourselves.”

‘Aerodynamic performance and tyre management’;

https://f1i.com/news/524766-briatore...r-in-2025.html


Clarkson’s beer run: A malty Alpine tradition
17 Nov 2024
F1i.com

The occasion? Celebrating Alpine’s sensational double-podium finish in São Paulo.

This malty tradition began after the Monaco Grand Prix in 2023, when Clarkson marked Esteban Ocon’s podium with the delivery of 1,000 pints to the team, vowing to repeat the gesture for every Alpine top-three finish.

True to his word, the former Top Gear UK star shared a celebratory toast with Pierre Gasly—because nothing says ‘team spirit’ like beer and banter. If Alpine keeps up its Brazilian form, Clarkson might need to trade his trailer for a tanker!

‘Double-podium finish’;

https://f1i.com/images/524706-clarks...tradition.html


FIA could not 'twist Renault's arm' over 2026 F1 quit decision
Renault has become the first 2026 power unit supplier to withdraw from F1.
16 Nov 2024
Jake Nichol & Aaron Deckers
RacingNews365

FIA single-seater technical chief Nikolas Tombazis insists it would not "twist somebody's arm" to stay as an F1 power unit manufacturer after Renault's withdrawal. Tombazis feels that despite the work Renault had put in to help design the rules, the FIA could not make it stay in F1 if it wanted to leave.

"We discussed when we defined the registration process that the registration was intended to cover the FIA costs of policing the PU manufacturers in creating these regulations," Tombazis told select media including RacingNews365. "But they are not intended to twist somebody's arm to continue to work in the sport.”

"It is 120, 130, 140 million and taken over five years, it is approaching a billion, and I don't think the FIA would ever constrain an OEM to having a $1 billion investment because they've registered and paid a small registration fee. It was always possible for anybody to pull out, and we want people to stay because they want to, not because we are forceful."

‘$1 billion investment’;


https://racingnews365.com/fia-could-...-quit-decision


Alpine ready to fire Jack Doohan to land Franco Colapinto
Doohan’s Formula 1 career could be over as few as five rounds into the 2025 season.
14 Nov 2024
Brandon Sutton
Total Motorsport

According to Gazzetta dello Sport, Briatore is not sold on the ex-Formula 2 driver and reports suggest his contract includes a five-race probationary period, allowing the team to make a swift change if his performances fall short of expectations

Alpine are said to be ready to fire Jack Doohan just a handful of races into the 2025 Formula 1 season to land Franco Colapinto, as Flavio Briatore remains unconvinced by the 21-year-old Australian driver.

His interest in Colapinto stems from the Argentine driver’s impressive late-season performances for Williams, where he replaced Logan Sargeant, and scored points twice in six races as he mirrors the pace of Alex Albon.

‘Five-race probationary period’;

https://www.total-motorsport.com/f1-...nco-colapinto/


Alpine confirm Mercedes F1 engine deal from 2026 season
Team to stop producing engines at end of 2025 having manufactured power units at French base since 1977.
Nov 13, 2024
Cian Brittle
BlackBook Motorsport

The Alpine Formula One team have confirmed their long-rumoured engine supply deal with Mercedes from the 2026 season. Mercedes will supply the Enstone-based outfit with power units until the 2030 season and the agreement also includes a supply of Mercedes gearboxes from the 2026 season.

It won’t be the first time that the Enstone-based outfit has been supplied by Mercedes engines, having agreed a one-year deal back in 2015 when the team ran under Lotus branding. Ultimately, it is hoped this move will provide significant cost savings for a team that saw profits fall 70 per cent to UK£7.8 million (US$10.4 million) in 2023, which will likely drop further when its 2024 financial results are confirmed next year.

It also makes Alpine a more attractive proposition for a sale if Renault Group executives lose patience with the entire programme, although de Meo previously ruled this out in June.

‘Manufactured power units at French base since 1977’;

https://www.blackbookmotorsport.com/...november-2024/


Alpine being prepared for F1 team sale says Plooij
Dutch F1 journalist Jack Plooij thinks Alpine is clearly being prepared for sale.
NOV 18, 2024
GrandPrix.com

“The Alpine team is going to be transferred to Hitech”, Plooij predicts to Ziggo Sport. “There was a lot of unrest, and it is clear that something is happening, thanks to Flavio Briatore”, he added, suggesting Alpine will now be much more attractive to buyers and investors.

Dutch GP boss Jan Lammers agrees. “It looks like Renault are slowly preparing an exit”, he said. “They're not leaving all at once, but first the team switched from Renault to Alpine, now Alpine is getting a Mercedes engine. This exit is happening in a filtered way.”

‘Being prepared’;

https://www.grandprix.com/news/alpin...ys-plooij.html