Hi friends,
Am I the only one who is just insanely tired today? I need a vacation.
Top story of the week: Sauber announces Bortoleto for the 2nd seat from 2025
The 2nd to last seat for 2025 has been secured, and despite seemingly every single available driver (and some unavailable ones) being rumoured to get it, Sauber has opted for youth over experience, signing former McLaren junior driver Gabriel Bortoleto on a multi-year deal from 2025.
Why is this important? While the pre-2024 driver market was a pretty dry round, 2025 has really produced som bangers – especially in the rookie department. No fewer than 4 rookies will be on the grid already – Doohan, Bearman, Bortoleto and Antonelli. And we may still get one more.
With the signing we can definitively say goodbye to drivers like Zhou, Magnussen, Bottas and Schumacher.
But another reason this is important, is that it has a bearing on the Colapinto situation. Most people agree that Colapinto should be on the grid for 2025, but with all the seats shored up, his odds of making it are looking very, very slim.
He was linked to the Sauber seat almost instantly after his first race, but now his only remaining chance is with VCARB – barring any surprises and a team sacking a driver to make room for him. I talked about this in a piece I wrote yesterday, but essentially what needs to happen is that Red Bull promotes Lawson to Perez’s seat, and buys out Colapinto from Williams and puts him in VCARB. Something I think isn’t likely, considering that Red Bull have both Iwasa and Hadjar ready to jump in to their sister team, without having to pay millions for the privilege.
Now the final piece in the 2025 driver puzzle, is what Red Bull is going to do about Sergio Perez.
The rest of the stories this week:
- The Grand Prix Drivers Association put out a statement, protesting the recent FIA clampdown on swearing
- George Russell calls for permanent stewards in Formula 1
- Jos Verstappen supports Lawson being promoted to Red Bull
- Mercedes has released a book about the team
- Alpine has dismissed around 300 people from the team
- MotoGP has cancelled the Valencia GP due to the devastating floods in the area
- The bronze statue of Gilles Villeneuve outside the Gilles Villeneuve Museum has been stolen
- F1 launches a new learning programme aimed to support STEM education
- Robert Schwartzman joins Prema for IndyCar in 2025
- Lamborghini is set to leave WEC ahead of 2025
- Sophia Flöersh won’t be able to participate in the Formula E all-women test
- Jak Crawford joins Andretti Formula E as their reserve and development driver
- The BTCC introduces 100% sustainable fuel
That’s it for this week. Until next time, thank you for being here.
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