Hello, welcome to a slightly different This Week on Boxing Day, this week instead of looking back at the last week we are going to reflect on the biggest news stories and each team’s season both on and off track. We also as always try to look at the bigger picture…
Looking Back
2022 was meant to be a season where the regulations were meant to shake up the grid, that was the aim early on it worked but after the summer it quickly became a one-horse race after the summer break. It was a season where Ferrari was back, but the same story of the last decade’s strong start and then in the second half the threat to Red Bull disappeared. That allowed them since Spa to cruise to victory.
Mercedes caught I think everyone by surprise given the near decade of domination and closeness of 2021, maybe we were all in a bit of denial up until Barcelona I think we all were thinking ‘oh they would they would be back at the next race. It was only in Austin I think we saw signs of the world championship-winning team.
The biggest off-track story which was beyond F1 control was Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, what the kremlin called a ‘special military operation.’ While we know that the race was cancelled, and Nikita Mazepin sacked by Haas the knock-on effects rising prices in the cost cap era would rumble on in the sports politics all season.
I’ve never seen apart from Covid, a global event affects the sport like this though the pandemic also played a role. While we continue to feel the effects of the pandemic we know that going into next year all restrictions are being lifted, but the ability to test will remain in place. How big of an impact both the war in Ukraine, the pandemic and global supply chains has had will become clear in March/April when the accounts are published by HMRC for UK-based teams and other relevant bodies.
This story is still likely to rumble on into 2023, we will get the accounts published by the teams as we know we are now in a cost cap. The row in the final races about Red Bull breaching the budget cap, I feel that was not a story which helped given the bitterness we had in 2021.
Burt as ever when you look back in years’ time the domination of Max Verstappen, who won fifteen races setting a new record on his way to his second title. I think Ferrari could have challenged them all the way but the operational issues but the question will be without those operational issues would they have been able to challenge for longer?
While the top three remained in a league of their own the battle between McLaren, and Alpine was as tight as ever but the thing which may have cost McLaren was the brake issues they had in Bahrain, and as we repeatedly said Daniel Ricciardo had not shown up this season and we know he was dropped by McLaren and replaced by Oscar Piastri.
Mercedes
Mercedes had dominated the sport over the last decade going into 2022, while they lost the 2021 drivers’ championship, they did take eighth consecutive constructors. But the fall of the giant followed in 2022, until the closing rounds at least, they made huge progress. I think George Russell has had a breakthrough two-years going back to Sakhir in 2020.
The progress we saw since especially from Singapore onwards confirmed it, even before then there had been flashes of the potential, I think early on given the success Mercedes have had over the last decade made us all deny how much they were struggling at the start of the year. Bahrain didn’t help with the third and fourth, helped by Red Bull’s retirements.
The way they came back in the second half of the year I think proved what we all suspected in the early races that they would be back sooner, but as the season went on you began to realise how far they were behind. Around Spa after the summer break, and the upgrade in Le Casttlett was I feel the start of the beginning of the revival.
But the challenge for Mercedes is how do they avoid this becoming a trend like we have seen with Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren as they don’t want “years in the wilderness.”
Russell in my view adapted better to the issues Mercedes had with the car, maybe that’s having come from a backmarker into a top team? But the relationship with Hamilton also was strong and the seven time champion said he didn’t think that if they are in a championship fight it wouldn’t deteriorate like it did with Nico Rosberg.
We know at Interlagos Russell won the sprint and Grand Prix, that was almost the feel good story, remember how the almost fairy-tale in Sakhir in 2020 went so horribly wrong with the tyre failure which cost him a maiden win. I think beating a seven time champion in your debut season as teammates, as Hamilton did himself in 2007 as a rookie against Fernando Alonso, shows an expectational driver. Russell could easily be Britain’s newest world champion, I am not wanting Hamilton to take that record
the team were effectively in no man’s land after testing and for much of the season but they are going into the winter looking to rejoin the front runners. The clever thing that the team does is seeing the season as a stepping stone and believing it was necessary to “re-energise and re-motivate the team.” Saying it made them appreciate how difficult its to win and recover. Mercedes will be aiming to bounce back next season, particularly against Red Bull after their whopping 205-point title victory.
I think the late resurgence without a major drama like we saw at Ferrari and Red Bull as well as other championship-winning teams who suffer a similar drop off following regulation changes. The challenge as we saw with Ferrari and Red Bull in the 2010s is how do they avoid losing this regulation period up until 2026, can they fight all the way for a championship.
I think Mercedes not winning this year, well only one race, if they can channel that championship-winning mentally and they have a great come back. The will have learned lessons this season and you need to imagine they will be stronger next year, which could create a three-horse race.
Hamilton’s fifteen season run with at least one win came to an end, but their was almost an “records don’t matter” mentally as we saw when he was going for championships. His focus was very much on coming back next year to fight for championship, I think he could be even more motivated to fight but he needs the car to do that.
Austin looking back was the big breakthrough, a race where they didn’t have the issues which affected them with the bouncing all season. The challenge now is now avoiding the post-dominance slump? To not being in the wilderness until the 2026 regulation changes.
Red Bull
Red Bull set new records in 2022 Max Verstappen being the first driver to take fifteen wins in a season, but it didn’t start well. While from Barcelona testing the car looked very quick in the opening races, they were shaky, the world champion retired from two of the first three races. In Melbourne, where Max Verstappen said “We’re already miles behind, so I don’t even want to think about the championship fight at the moment.”
Then he started to turn it around with several wins, thinking back to the summer break I thought it would be difficult to see Verstappen dominating but Ferrari didn’t seem to get their act together to be unstoppable in Miami and especially after the summer break.
But Red Bull found themselves often targeted by trolls, yes Mercedes as well, given the row about last year’s championship decider the question of legitimacy over Verstappen’s first title, would be brought up again when they were found to have breached the 2021 cost cap.
This season you need to say proved Verstappen is an exceptional driver, I posed the question how do you move from one to two championships? Well he did setting new records and if there was any doubt about how 2021 played out the Dutchman underlined he is an exceptional driver but the way he dominated the second half of the season.
The final two races were dominated by a row between Verstappen and Perez, relating “to something which happened in the past” believed to be Perez’s crash in qualifying in Monaco. I wonder and there has in my mind always been something with Verstappen, like with your Hamilton’s, Michael Schumacher’s, Ayrton Senna’s which puts him on that other level.
The bigger question is given that elephant in the room following Mexico City when Verstappen refused to answer the reason, he didn’t help Perez, but if they are in the championship fight which is extremely likely next year could this be their undoing? But hopefully, the winter break can take some of that friction, however, it could be their undoing if they aren’t as dominant.
Next year, we need to think they will be the team to beat, but it will be interesting to see how much of the sliding scale of wind tunnel time affects them and does that lead to Mercedes and Ferrari getting closer to them? But we know one of the strengths of Red Bull is their stability and that allows them to build on this year and potentially dominate until 2026.
Ferrari
Following a disastrous 2020 and a winless two seasons, Ferrari’s early gamble to focus on the regulation changes appeared to pay off, from testing they looked to be in the fight. With Verstappen retiring from two of the first three races Charles Leclerc gave the Scuderia the best start to the seasons hard to think after Barcelona they were just one win behind Red Bull it was shaping up to be a close season.
After Barcelona I was beginning to feel that this could potentially be a fight with Red Bull which will last all year, the challenge both for Leclerc and Ferrari is can they be stronger next year. I did speculate and we can’t answer this way into next year, ‘whether losing this championship would make them championship winners.’
But then the mistakes started to follow and that in the latter part of the year lead to Mattia Binotto resigning at the end of November. Ferrari admitted that chairman John Elkann and Binotto had “discussed openly what was the best way to move forward” and “decided to release a statement that was maybe the best way to close any speculation”.
Leclerc has accepted his role in costing him the championship with his own mistakes, but he has always been a self-critical driver. He believes they dropped around a hundred points through mistakes, I think next year could be hugely important for Leclerc if the upheaval of replacing Binotto doesn’t set them back further. Maybe the Monacan needs to be less self-critical to help him improve?
Binotto is being replaced by Fred Vasseur, that I think is a safe pair of hands given his experience at Alfa Romeo. But the challenge for him is building of the back of the strengths that smaller budget mentality, I think his background as an engineer and running both Renault/Alpine and Sauber/Alfa Romeo, plus his relationship with Leclerc could help put the mistakes behind them.
McLaren
McLaren was another team to have a Bahrain nightmare, at the second test Daniel Ricciardo caught COVID meanwhile on track the team suffered a brake issue. They later would later admit it put them on the back foot for the entire season leading to them losing out in the battle with Alpine in the constructors.
Ricciardo’s future would become the dominating story for the team, he really struggled which surprised everyone I feel. That then lead to rumours that his contract, as we now know it was terminated a year early, they replaced him with Oscar Piastri, that then prompted a contract dispute with Alpine.
Alpine claimed they had a valid contract with Piastri, however, the contract recognition board ruled in McLaren’s favour. The row was defining of the strength of McLaren’s management and left Alpine looking bad, the team were largely carried by Lando Norris making the partnership with Piastri really exciting. They have now I feel the mix of youth and experience and one of the youngest pairings on the grid for next year.
Looking back I think they had a very similar pattern, with Norris at least, where they had a decent recovery and I think this season further confirmed that he could be a future champion. But we know the car was not the step forwards and that the Englishman admitted having to change his driving style to suit these cars, and I think that has been largely successful.
I feel though that over the last two years Norris has been a driver which has extracted the most out of the car in the midfield, and beating Ricciardo I think proves he could be championship material. But there is a realistic message that 2023 is a year when it’s about getting the new wind tunnel online and I think they could target 2024 as one for major gains, as higher than fifth they believe is not realistic.
Alpine
Alpine also had their own “shambles” pre-season, but like Mercedes progressed to become a consistent leader of the midfield and finish fourth in the constructors ahead of McLaren. They had flashes of being the midfield leader but it could have been a lot closer with McLaren.
The team had two good drivers in Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso, who I feel maximised the potential although things between them ended disastrously with friction at the penultimate race in Interlagos. I believe that they would eventually clash given their egos but they got to the end of the year almost before they fell out. They were both delivering results which helped them as well as getting on top of their teething issues before McLaren.
We know they are one of these teams which have the target by the parent company of challenging for championships by the end of the decade, but if the rumours are true about Ocon and Pierre Gasly they have history. You need to hope whatever that history is that they can work together.
The team has been in the sport as a works team for seven years, after the parent company brought back Lotus in 2015, they need to make that next step I feel if they want to join the likes of Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes. They are heading in the right direction.
I think however the team are another who could be on the way up, as they have Otmar Szafnauer who will have overseen the 2023 project for the first time will be of advantage to him. If he needs to manage the situation between Gasly and Ocon, though we don’t know the details of the junior career.
We know also they have history having come up through karting together, it will be interesting how they get on as teammates. I think Szafnauer knows how to manage his drivers and that along with the mentality of managing drivers who have tensions including Ocon at Force India/Racing Point when he was there, hopefully that allows him to manage his drivers effectively.
Alpha Tauri
Alpha Tauri was another team in my mind to slip back given the performances they had in recent years. In my mind looking back, their seems to be no real stand our performance compared to recent years, that’s despite the domination of sister team Red Bull. I think that proves that having a big team as partners in the way Alpha Tauri does doesn’t mean success.
But yet we know how close they are both technically and finically to Red Bull, I think they went in a different direction, and we haven’t had the controversy we might have if they had. I think it shows that you can have these partnerships but its still down to you to make your own success.
We know that in recent years they have talked about before Pierre Gasly’s decision to join Alpine, about building the team around him. Following that announcement Yuki Tsunoda admitted that he needs to ‘step up’ and be a more complete as a driver and stop making these mistakes if he is to lead the team, but I think for the Japanese driver it has been a better year which shows he is on the right path.
Nyck De Vires, we know is replacing Gasly next year, the Dutch former Formula E champion has had plenty of mileage this year through Mercedes, Williams and Aston Martin that will help him. He also had a brilliant debut at Monza where he switched teams mid weekend getting through to Q2 and finishing ninth.
I think it will be interesting to see who emerges as the teams leader, De Vires could once settled in could potentially challenge Tsunoda. But I feel the team may have been disappointed with the step backwards given their close ties to Red Bull, I feel they should be able to move forwards if they sort their problems out.
Aston Martin
The big story of the year was Sebastian Vettel’s retirement, I looking back over the past few years believed the four-time champion was facing a decision ‘does he go for a long career’ or stop without doing damage to his reputation? Vettel, I think made the right decision, I think he isn’t that exceptional driver, like you’re Ayrton Senna’s, Hamilton and Verstappen’s, there hasn’t been consistency of ‘those moments of magic’ throughout his career.
Reflecting on the year team principal Mike Krack said in late-November, the team was on target with its long-term goal of challenging for championships by the middle of the decade, saying their recovery this season was “very impressive recovery.” But also admitted he was wary about making big changes after joining just before the start of the season.
The team maybe were caught out by the regulation changes and the challenge I think that they maybe one of these teams who could write off the next few years to focus on 2026. However, that will not please Fernando Alonso who we know is still hungry for success and championships, you need to hope that this doesn’t turn sour as every team he has left and joined their has been some kind of controversy or drama.
I think we saw some improvement towards the end of the season, but the challenge is returning to the midfield status they regularly had between 2014 and 2020. They are another just in this phase of rebuilding, but historically following a change of ownership they have gone backwards. But this was a rebrand rather than a change of ownership, they could be focusing more on the redevelopment of their Silverstone base for 2026?
It will be interesting to see how Alonso copes if they aren’t competitive next year as we know he wants to be challenging for wins and championships, how long until we see the divisive Spaniard caused drama. I think it will be interesting to see how this develops going through next year, but we know he is hungry for a third championship but this to move in this context given the performance of the team this year.
Alfa Romeo
This season the team had a brand-new line up with Valtteri Bottas and Guanyu Zhou, they in my mind were a team who have this pattern of starting the season strongly then dropping away. But we know they are in this transition phase over the next few years back to being a works team, I think they need that need to build towards Audi’s takeover for 2026.
The challenge is very similar to its rivals in the bottom end of the of the midfield, is to make that jump into permeant being a midfield challenger then another jump. Bottas and Zhou look to be a good partnership, it will be interesting to see how this evolves into next year.
We also know that next year, following the move of Vassuer to Ferrari their will be a new team principal. They have replaced him with Andreas Sidel, he has a really good reparation and he previous worked for the team when it was BMW Sauber and for Audi/Porsche who are planning to enter in 2026 with the team. So this move makes sense.
I think this team are another team looking towards the medium term and the next engine regulations to make gains. Bottas could if he wants to be in the sport for five to seven years could be a huge assets to that team, also he and Zhou would have overseen the whole move to new ownership. But given his experience at Mercedes we know the Finn wanted a clean break, could that make him potentially warry of works teams
Williams
This year Williams would have been seen as an opportunity to make a step forwards both because of the regulation changes and the new investment from Dorilton. However, as they finished bottom of the constructors’ championship, Alex Albon was the real carrier of the team in terms of scoring points.
I feel as if they are still in the rebuilding phase and now we have a budget cap over the next few years I think they could start to close into the midfield. Albon, according to Helmut Marko had his ‘career destroyed through incidents with Hamilton,’ but has thrived outside the Red Bull family.
But we know they are another team who will have a new team principal after Jost Capito stepped down in December. I believe whoever takes over has to make a choice between improving or a big jump in 2026, the team I believe they could be on their way back now we are in the era of cost caps. I feel they have a good driver in Albon, but his links to Red Bull means he could in the future go back in the future.
Albon if he has another good season could be the one to watch in the future and their could be a decent driver, but going up midway his debut season against Max Verstappen for a year and a half was too soon and having a year out as well as the incidents with Hamilton which ‘destroyed his career’ according to Helmut Marko. He needs to continue to continue to almost show he deserves a long term future in the sport, even a chance to return to a top team.
Haas
Haas’s year started with sacking of Nikita Mazepin, a global event which shaped most of the off-track events of 2022 was when Russia launched what it called a ‘special military operation’ when it invaded Ukraine. The war would as we know effect the whole sport because of the rising inflation and lead also to a row about the cost cap.
Going into the season, it looked as if the scarify of last years car looked to pay off but I think despite falling into the pattern we have seen since they entered the sport of not being able to consistently for the whole season. I always, maybe over hyped, the potential of Mick Schumacher, but Jeddah looking back along with his other crashes cost him a chance of continuing.
Kevin Magnussen who replaced Mazepin, got his third chance in the sport something which not many drivers get, I was surprised and wondered if it was between the Dane and Romain Grosjean, why they went for him. I could be romancing about the phoenix rising from the ashes follow Bahrain in 2020. But I think that Magnussen has given the fact he has had a year out came back into the sport with nothing to lose this being his third comeback.
The challenge for next year, is how can they get out of the cycle of starting the season strongly and then not filter out of the midfield battle when the upgrade war starts. The financial regulation changes may help them to close the gap further, but how do they move first to be fighting in the midfield regularly and consistently over a course of the season.
The other thing is Magnussen and Hulkenberg as teammates, they do have a bit of history when fighting each other, remember Magnussen telling Hulkenberg to “suck my balls” in Budapest in 2017 after Hulkenberg said the Dane “Once again the most unsporting driver on the grid.”
This is what they said in Jeddah back in March “It was dramatized massively, I’m getting really tired of this subject. Between me and Nico there’s really been only one incident in Hungary two years ago.”
While Hulkenberg added “It’s not like I dislike Kevin but after that happened in Budapest we haven’t really spoken a word since. Even before that, we’ve never really spoken to each other.” I think its buried but tension could resurface if they are evenly matched on track that could cause tensions between the two, but
Behind This Week
Developing this format over the last year has been fun, I hoped you’ve enjoyed the mix of news, my thoughts, and analysis as I’ve tried to bring you the most important stories with the facts. This is written almost every day Monday to Friday, I hoped it brought you the stories which matter and the bigger picture.
Why Sunday morning (or evening) I think that is the right time to reflect and review the week and on race weekends look back on the story of the weekend. Dropping the Notebook I believe makes this more effective in analysing and understanding
The BBC’s analysis editor Ros Atkins has helped me to think about how I present the stories which matter, cutting through the spin and bring you the facts. My analysis adding depth and context to the story, I feel this is more relaxed and written in a way where you get the facts and an understanding.
2022 top ten ranking
These are my top ten drivers ranking, not based on championship or results my gut feeling about how they performed over the course of the season compared to 2021, with the car and team they had, as well as their progress across the season.
| Drivers | Constructors | |
| 1 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull |
| 2 | Charles Leclerc | Mercedes |
| 3 | George Russell | Ferrari |
| 4 | Fernando Alonso | Alpine |
| 5 | Carlos Sainz | Haas |
| 6 | Sergio Perez | McLaren |
| 7 | Lewis Hamilton | Aston Martin – Mercedes |
| 8 | Kevin Magnussen | Alpha Tauri – Red Bull |
| 9 | Alex Albon | Williams – Mercedes |
| 10 | Guanyu Zuho | Alfa Romeo – Ferrari |
The Year Ahead
So another year done, the aim of the regulations introduced this year was about levelling up that hasn’t been achieved given how Max Verstappen dominated the season, which he shouldn’t have. The challenge as we said throughout the second half of season was stopping Verstappen, Mercedes will not want a repeat of 2022 where they only overtook Ferrari at the end of 2022.
Ferrari I think have the biggest lessons to learn given how as we discussed in this review, stop the title slipping away under the new leadership of Fred Vasseur. Can he improve the team operationally, so they don’t make the same mistakes if as we expect them to have a good car. Charles Leclerc I feel would have learned a lot its now about using that next year, like Nico Rosberg in 2016, to fight all the way for the championship.
The test for the year ahead is whether this handicap system of reducing things like wind tunnel time does have an impact when it comes to closing the gap. We know as well it will be the second year when the cost caps will be published and you need to wonder have people learned lessons from what happened this year. I hope it’s a more effective and quicker in getting the reports done as it seemed to drag on is the cost cap report.
The other thing, while the midfield was very competitive, no one appeared to make that jump to challenge the top three. while we do want that in time I think given the changes we had this year it may have been close again, no one appeared to make that jump to Mercedes or take that step to close the gap between the midfield and top three
