Expectations for rest of 2024 F1 championship: Ferrari reorganizes, Red Bull optimizes, McLaren dreams. F1: what to expect from Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren.

Formula 1 is currently on summer break so that gives us plenty of time to look back on the performance of Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren: the four teams that contested pole positions and victories in the first half of the 2024 championship. At the start of the season, the RB20 still seemed like the car to beat. While a repeat of the previous year’s dominance wasn’t expected, it was believed that the competitive edge might last throughout the entire year, especially since the Milton Keynes team hadn’t updated the RB19 since last summer and was focused on the new car. However, things changed within two months. Thankfully, too, as another season of overwhelming supremacy would have been quite dull for fans.

McLaren arrived at the Miami International Circuit with a substantial aerodynamic package of updates that effectively transformed the MCL38. Lando Norris’s victory signaled this change of pace, though it’s worth noting the result was favored by the Safety Car that greatly benefited the young Briton. From this point on, the papaya-colored cars became highly competitive. Meanwhile, Ferrari wasn’t far behind. The Scuderia had already won at the Albert Park circuit in Australia with an impressive Carlos Sainz, who crossed the finish line first, despite having recently undergone an appendectomy, just ahead of his Maranello teammate Charles Leclerc, but a one-two finish for the Italian side that was greatly helped by Max Verstappen’s early retirement. The SF-24 was performing very close to Red Bull’s level, and in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at the Imola circuit, the Ferrari technicians introduced the first major aerodynamic package of the season.

We are talking about the revised sidepods, a solution copied from the reigning world champions, on which the Maranello team placed many hopes. Ferrari expected a further step forward, as the RB20 seemed almost within reach, and the hope of fighting at the top was real. This hope was confirmed on the streets of Monte Carlo in Monaco, where the Italian car delivered an extraordinary performance with Charles Leclerc. It was a dominant and amazing weekend, anticipating another update at the Circuit de Catalunya in Spain that was expected to close the gap on Red Bull and McLaren definitively.

Mercedes, after a truly tragic start in sporting terms, also began to show significant signs of recovery. These signs quickly became a reality, as the data the Brackley team had been struggling with suddenly made sense. The confirmation came at the Red Bull Ring in Austria, with the first fortunate success of the W15, driven by George Russell. This victory was followed by Lewis Hamilton’s outstanding performance in England, then Hungary and Belgium, as Oscar Piastri won at the Hungaroring circuit and the future Ferrari driver triumphed at Spa-Francorchamps after the disqualification of his Mercedes teammate after his W15 car was found to be underweight following the post-race legality checks.

This is a brief overview from the start of the 2024 Formula 1 championship up to the summer break, just enough details to get an idea of how things have gone. During the three-week pause, it’s time for all teams to reflect. They need to consider the work done, the problems encountered, what could have been but wasn’t, and which areas could be improved to gain an advantage. Each team must set an action plan with clear objectives. We’ll try to do that now on this summer Monday, anticipating how the four teams under examination might perform from the Dutch Grand Prix onwards.

Let’s start with the titleholders. Red Bull has all the tools to achieve its goals once again. But at the same time it is true that the RB20 has several issues, the biggest likely being the car’s operating window. The Austrian single-seaters have a lot of potential but often struggle to unlock it and this limitation has been frustrating for Max Verstappen. Moreover, the development phase hasn’t been beneficial so far, rendering the team’s efforts fruitless. We must also consider the Sergio Perez issue, as the Mexican has been crashing often and has been of little help to the team in recent months.

The favor of the prediction still lies in their hands. The best driver wears Red Bull colors and currently enjoys a 78-point lead over Lando Norris. A substantial margin, that if wisely managed, can make the difference. And we know that Red Bull and the Dutchman have the ability to manage the gap. On the other hand, the Constructors’ target is more complicated, as 42 points are too few to be comfortable, and as mentioned, Sergio Perez is doing everything but supporting his team. However, technical resources are not lacking, and with upcoming aerodynamic updates, the Austrian team expects to return to a status where they can easily fight for victory in all the remaining races of the 2024 Formula 1 campaign.

Now let’s move on to McLaren: the Woking team did not expect to be so high up in 2024. Zak Brown’s comments reaffirm a fact: McLaren was not at all prepared for the fight at the top, something confirmed on the track. The two MCL38 cars have been wasteful because, from Miami onward, they have shown the potential to cross the finish line first in every single event on the Formula 1 calendar. They are technically very prepared and enjoy a fundamental advantage, which is very important for the current generation of cars, namely versatility. This refers to the adaptability that the British cars demonstrate, despite different layouts, consistently accessing the car’s maximum competitiveness.

McLaren’s goal is clear: to fight for the world championship. The Constructors’ title could be within reach, given that the team has two fast drivers, while Red Bull only has one. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri cand therefore challenge Max Verstappen on multiple fronts, but to do this, they need to eliminate mistakes. A change in approach has already been planned with updates that will be smaller but more frequent. The Drivers’ title is more complicated because Lando Norris, the closest opponent to Max Verstappen, does not seem mature enough to try for it. Meanwhile, Oscar Piastri is 100 points behind the Dutchman, which is a bit too much.

Focusing on Mercedes, team principal Toto Wolff has been clear, supporting an honest concept: although Mercedes has won three races, it is still not on the level of Red Bull and McLaren. They are still missing a couple of tenths in terms of pure performance, which will not be easy to recover. The W15 single-seaters are excellent cars, and once corrected, they have shown interesting characteristics. However, there is still a lot of work to be done. In the three victories, there was always a determining factor to help the team, such as the Max Verstappen – Lando Norris clash in Austria, favorable weather conditions at the Silverstone circuit, the Dutchman’s penalty and McLaren’s very poor management of the Belgian weekend at the 7.004-kilometre Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps.

This shows that Mercedes has the ability to capitalize on opportunities, and they have rightly brought home these results. The technical goal is to strengthen the W15 to lay the foundation for 2025, the last season of the current regulatory framework, in which the Brackley team wants to return to recent glories and fight to win a world championship, in short. In the meantime, they want to do the best possible, finish ahead of Ferrari, and plan for the future without Lewis Hamilton. It seems that Kimi Antonelli will replace him, an important bet that Toto Wolff is convinced he can win.

For Ferrari, the goal for the second part of the 2024 Formula 1 campaign is clear: to correct the SF-24 and organize at the corporate level. Ferrari started the season in an encouraging manner, in many ways even better than many expected, but as the season gradually progressed, they encountered the same situation which the Maranello team has unfortunately gotten used to for almost seventeen years now. They end up behind due to the in-season developments. The reasons are numerous, and we know them by heart, as we have spoke about them repeatedly. Technically speaking, the SF-24 needs to be corrected in some fundamental aspects. Although, like Mercedes, they are missing about 2 tenths of performance, these often become 4 or 5 due to additional problems that block the full potential of the Ferrari car. So the focus must be first on correcting and then on updating: doing both at the same time doesn’t seem possible at the moment. This is the impression the Maranello team gives.

In the second part of the 2024 Formula 1 championship, the main goal is to stop making a poor showing. The objectives are a few stage wins and laying the corporate groundwork to create a cohesive 360-degree working group. The addition of new technicians and the famous “mystery man” still need to happen, after the missed and painful attempt to secure Adrian Newey. For the Italian side, clear ideas are needed, a fixed chain of command, far fewer words than those spoken, and a lot of action. All this while waiting for Lewis Hamilton, who, without a competitive car, will be able to do little more, just as is the case for Charles Leclerc.