Rumours run wild ahead of Hungary
My thoughts on this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix and a couple of significant rumours circulating online.
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The Hungarian Grand Prix is here and it looks set to be an intriguing weekend. Hungary is a different kind of track from the last two and the race will witness the much-anticipated return of Daniel Ricciardo. I, like almost everyone in the world, will be fascinated to see how he gets on as he takes over the AlphaTauri from the ousted Nyck de Vries.
I was very interested to read stories this week that suggest the AlphaTauri car will not be ideal for Ricciardo. Motorsport.com and The Race both wrote about this, with Motorsport.com reporting the AlphaTauri car is weak “in the very area that left [Ricciardo] struggling so much during his two years at McLaren.” That doesn’t bode well.
What’s worse for Ricciardo is that his new teammate - Yuki Tsunoda - is anything but a slouch. In fact, Tsunoda has delivered relatively strong performances throughout 2023. He has finished either 10th or 11th in half of this year’s races. Back in Austria, Oscar Piastri said that he’d rate Tsunoda as one of the top three best-performing drivers of the season. During the same weekend, AlphaTauri boss Franz Tost praised Tsunoda for doing “a fantastic job”. Meanwhile, earlier in the year, The Athletic gave a special shoutout to Tsunoda for soldiering on in such a terrible car, reporting: “It’s fair to say Yuki Tsunoda is earning his place – as well as a new reputation for extracting consistent quality from a backfield car.”
With a tough car and a tough teammate, I think Ricciardo is going to face a harsh awakening this weekend. My prediction is that Tsunoda will out-qualify him and finish ahead in the race. What do you think? Let me know in the comments.
Now, I appreciate by this point you might be getting sick of the Daniel Ricciardo content. I sort of am. But there’s one more thing I want to mention related to this saga. Red Bull team boss Christian Horner appeared on the F1 Nation podcast this week and spoke about axing Nyck de Vries, saying this:
“Obviously a difficult situation for Nyck de Vries, but there was a high expectation on him because, whilst inexperienced in Formula 1, he’s obviously a very experienced driver. I think there was a general feeling that Nyck wasn’t quite hitting the mark and the question was, ‘what are the options if we were to switch things around?’ And from a Red Bull Racing perspective, the most interesting option was to see how Daniel [Ricciardo] performed, that was the decision that was made, it all happened pretty quick and here he is for the Hungarian Grand Prix.”
What struck me about this was the simplistic way that Horner couched the subject of firing De Vries. When he puts it like this, it just makes sense. He wasn’t performing and Ricciardo was an available option… 1 + 1 is 2.
Last week I mentioned there was a rumour swirling about Ferrari eyeing up the in-form Alex Albon. It sounds like a spicy story and desperate exploits from a truly lost team, but it appears to be untrue. Ferrari is officially denying the rumour.
This week, Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur told the Italian edition of Motorsport.com he had no idea where the rumour came from. Vasseur explained that he thought Albon was doing a good job in F1, “but that doesn't mean I'm interested in taking him”. Vasseur said the contracts of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz do not need to be discussed right now and the focus of the team was on the current season. Both Leclerc and Sainz have contracts with Ferrari until the end of the 2024 season.
So Vasseur may have poured cold water on this for now, but, here’s something about this that I’m keeping in the back of my mind. Earlier this year, Vasseur pointedly shot down speculation about the imminent departure of Ferrari sporting director Laurent Mekies, saying he would be “one of the pillars of the future”. Yet, just a month later, Mekies’ departure from Ferrari was confirmed.
Alright, I realise I’m dragging this newsletter out a bit, but there are just two more tantalising tidbits I want to highlight.
Firstly, the Italian edition of Motorsport.com is reporting a rumour that three teams have broken the cost cap for the 2022 season. If this is indeed true, it’ll be huge news. Do you remember the insane ruckus last year when it emerged that Red Bull had broken the 2021 cap? (leading to a $7 million fine and a reduction in their aerodynamic testing time). McLaren went nuclear and outright accused Red Bull of being cheats.
Right now, it’s not clear who the allegedly naughty three teams are - and it is important to note that no breaches have been officially confirmed. The Italian Motorsport.com story indicated, however, that F1’s governing body, the FIA, is due to sign off the spending from 2022 by the end of this month.
I’d say if the rumours are true, then we’re going to be in for an angry debate in all corners about suitable punishments, future deterrents and the fitness of the cost cap itself.
Lastly, I really to point out that former F1 driver Pedro de la Rosa validated the whole point of my latest free post when he appeared on the F1 Nation podcast. My post highlighted how the F1 field has been far more competitive this year, despite Red Bull’s newfound dominance. Here’s what Pedro said on the podcast:
“… It’s just the fact it’s so close between four [or] five teams now, that it’s very circuit-specific. We will go to a track and there could be Mercedes, it could be Aston, any of these teams [that have an edge] … It can be very difficult for teams to make it to Q3 because we are talking four or five teams which is already 10 [or] 12 cars, over half of the grid. So it’s difficult to know when you approach a track how quick you will be, that’s how tough it is, that’s how close it is, and that’s how great Formula 1 is at the moment.”
Thanks for reading my paid newsletter! I hope you enjoy the race in Hungary this weekend. And just warning you now: I’ll probably have something to say about Ricciardo’s performance in next week’s newsletter, so stay tuned for that. Cheers.