The Official F1 2025 silly season *contains speculation*

[Hustle_]

rallycross said:

Sandpit Steve said:

If they were going to be sensible, they’d leave Bearman in the car for the rest of the season.

If he does well then this could happen and Kevin M gets paid off.

I don’t want Magnussen jnr’s career to end that way

[hondajack85]

Gentle reminder that Bearman is in the Haas not the Ferrari next race.
A whole rest of the season with Hulkenburg battering him in quali and the races would not look good.
Obviously it will be the 2nd coming if he outshines Nico next race.

[The Hypno-Toad]

Here we are try this one on for size.

Repsol have just announced they have finished sponsoring the Honda Moto GP team, while also stating that they will be continuing in motorsports.

Remind me, who has just signed to everyone's great surprise to a team that been a bit rubbish for quite some time but has spent the season recruiting some properly talented behind the scenes staff?

And which company sponsored that drivers dad through his entire rallying career?

Team Repsol Williams Mercedes anyone?

[spikyone]

hondajack85 said:

Gentle reminder that Bearman is in the Haas not the Ferrari next race.
A whole rest of the season with Hulkenburg battering him in quali and the races would not look good.
Obviously it will be the 2nd coming if he outshines Nico next race.

If Hulkenberg batters Bearman then Bearman doesn't deserve to be in F1. Hulk, despite his inexplicable popularity, is mediocre. Equally, Bearman beating Hulk won't mean much.

It's pretty unlikely that Hulk will batter him. Worth reiterating that Bearman showed well when dropped into someone else's Ferrari with little warning, on one of the hardest circuits of the season - fast, with lots of blind corners, and no run-off.
He didn't have enough time to set the car up yet gradually edged towards Leclerc's lap times throughout the race. In the last 10-12 laps, both CLC and Bearman were lapping around 1:32.6 - and Bearman was impressively consistent.

Given the nature of Baku, he should perform well there too. I'd like to see him finish the season in F2 and prepare for F1 properly over the winter though. He wasn't F1-fit in Saudi (his headrest was wrecked after the race) and I doubt he is now.

[732NM]

The Hypno-Toad said:

Here we are try this one on for size.

Repsol have just announced they have finished sponsoring the Honda Moto GP team, while also stating that they will be continuing in motorsports.

Remind me, who has just signed to everyone's great surprise to a team that been a bit rubbish for quite some time but has spent the season recruiting some properly talented behind the scenes staff?

And which company sponsored that drivers dad through his entire rallying career?

Team Repsol Williams Mercedes anyone?

They were Marc Marquez main sponsor in MotoGP, he has signed for the Ducati factory team for next year. They couldn't leave Honda early when Marc did, because he broke the contract with Honda, he was supposed to be there this year.

[Sixpackpert]

732NM said:

The Hypno-Toad said:

Here we are try this one on for size.

Repsol have just announced they have finished sponsoring the Honda Moto GP team, while also stating that they will be continuing in motorsports.

Remind me, who has just signed to everyone's great surprise to a team that been a bit rubbish for quite some time but has spent the season recruiting some properly talented behind the scenes staff?

And which company sponsored that drivers dad through his entire rallying career?

Team Repsol Williams Mercedes anyone?

They were Marc Marquez main sponsor in MotoGP, he has signed for the Ducati factory team for next year. They couldn't leave Honda early when Marc did, because he broke the contract with Honda, he was supposed to be there this year.

Didn’t Repsol sponsor Honda the team, not Marquez personally. They had sponsored Honda for 30 years.

[ralphrj]

The Hypno-Toad said:

Here we are try this one on for size.

Repsol have just announced they have finished sponsoring the Honda Moto GP team, while also stating that they will be continuing in motorsports.

Remind me, who has just signed to everyone's great surprise to a team that been a bit rubbish for quite some time but has spent the season recruiting some properly talented behind the scenes staff?

And which company sponsored that drivers dad through his entire rallying career?

Team Repsol Williams Mercedes anyone?

Repsol also sponsored Honda for 4 of Mick Doohan's 5 500cc world championships and his son has just signed for Alpine...

[ajprice]

Whichever team it's with, I like the idea of a Repsol livery F1 car.



(This is an old F2 car)

[DanielSan]

Given Williams few other sponsors if they did sign to them I'd be expecting this

[Teppic]

DanielSan said:

Given Williams few other sponsors if they did sign to them I'd be expecting this

If Williams did sign Repsol I'm sure James Vowles would ensure that the livery was designed by someone with eyes.

[vaud]

At least all teams were inside the budget for 2023 and some procedural (so minor) breaches for Honda and Alpine.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/honda-and-alpin...

[Forester1965]

This year's Honda engine is a curious thing. It's obviously been developed aggressively and it's impacted on reliability. All the Honda drivers have used a lot of components. Verstappen's going to lose grid places the moment the next component farts.

[Sandpit Steve]

Will Buxton on F1TV confirms what was rumoured, that there’s a meeting of the Red Bull management team next week to discuss Liam Lawson.

Options appear to be:

1. Offer him Ricciardo’s seat for ‘25
2. Swap with Ricciardo for the rest of this season
3. Let him go, thanks to a break clause in his contract.

Colapinto also said to be on Sauber’s radar, as is Bottas and possibly Schwartzman. Lawrence Baretto thinks they stick with Bottas as a safe pair of hands for the transition to Audi.

[Still Mulling]

Audi have Hulk for set up and development. If they are serious about the long term, I feel they need a quick, exciting, and potentially partially proven youngster on their books. Bottas would be a cop-out, IMO, and I say that liking the chap and respecting his achievements to date.

RB will look like oafs to me if they ditch Lawson.

[n3il123]

Still Mulling said:

Audi have Hulk for set up and development. If they are serious about the long term, I feel they need a quick, exciting, and potentially partially proven youngster on their books. Bottas would be a cop-out, IMO, and I say that liking the chap and respecting his achievements to date.

RB will look like oafs to me if they ditch Lawson.

Exactly if they ditch Liam then then could potentially be really quite short of drivers in a year or so what with Riciardo and Perez not looking too great and rumours all over the place that Max could be off ot either Mercedes or Aston for 2026.

[Muzzer79]

Still Mulling said:

RB will look like oafs to me if they ditch Lawson.

To me, the whole management of the team looks to be in disarray and decisions like this are being made for internal power-gain, rather than on-track performance

It therefore wouldn't surprise me if they did ditch him........

[andburg]

Muzzer79 said:

To me, the whole management of the team looks to be in disarray and decisions like this are being made for internal power-gain, rather than on-track performance

It therefore wouldn't surprise me if they did ditch him........

He's not good enough, he's just the best they have and not promoting him makes their entire development program a joke.

[Finlandese]

Blick reports that Bottas was signed for a one year extension.

[PRO5T]

Finlandese said:

Blick reports that Bottas was signed for a one year extension.

When you look at the numbers, Bottas has been very much on form for the past two years, he’s wasted in a Sauber.

He’s basically an older Saintz so I can see why Williams went down that route but if I was a managing Haas or Alpine I’d have been putting him alongside Bearman or Gasly.

I suppose he’d be wasted in those cars too.

Either that anyways, or Zhou is pretty bad-which may also be the case.

[Muzzer79]

Finlandese said:

Blick reports that Bottas was signed for a one year extension.

Sensible choice