Yes, you read that right! Before I started this website, I would make endless amounts of PowerPoints on all the sports I enjoyed, and whilst going through them all the other day, I came across a very interesting one that saw me Predict the 2025 Formula 1 Grid! I honestly have no idea why I decided to do this, I was probably bored, but there’s some interesting answers on here which is why I thought it might be fun to take a look back! It’s worth mentioning that back in 2022, Max Verstappen was entering his first year as a reigning World Champion, Mercedes had won 8-straight Constructors’ Titles, Pierre Gasly had had an amazing 2021, and Haas had just come back from one of the worst season’s in F1 history! Also, I actually included Andretti in this so that’s another added element here! So, without further ado, let’s start with Mercedes!
Mercedes: George Russell and Lando Norris
So, Mercedes’ lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Lewis Hamilton and George Russell whilst Mercedes’ lineup heading into 2025 is George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli! At the time, George Russell was just entering his first season as a proper Mercedes driver after 3 years of being a backmarker at Williams! George was hyped up as Merc’s next big thing, so it was pretty easy to expect him to still be around a few years later! As for his teammate, Lando Norri was about to enter his 4th year with McLaren after a particularly strong 2021 which sort of established him towards the top of the field in terms of overall ability! At the time, McLaren were nowhere near competing for Championships whilst Mercedes were the standard, so it kind of felt natural for Lando to move up the pecking order, and there was also history of McLaren drivers leaving to go to the Silver Arrows! Ultimately, that didn’t happen, and you could argue that McLaren and Mercedes have swapped (I mean, they have in terms of the Constructors’ Standings), but this certainly isn’t a bad prediction!
Red Bull: Max Verstappen and Dennis Hauger
Okay, well this is certainly something! Firstly, Red Bull’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Max Verstappen and Liam Lawson! Secondly, Max Verstappen had recently won his first World Drivers’ Championship, and he was firmly expected to win more hence why I had him to stay at Red Bull. In fact, when I wrote these Predictions, Max had “only” won 20 Races, whilst now he has 63 Grand Prix victories to his name (which is actually insane)! As for his teammate, Dennis Hauger had just come off the back of winning FIA Formula 3, and if you’ve read any of my F2 or other Motorsport Articles over the year, you would know that I very much brought into the hype that surrounded the young Norwegian! Because of this, I thought Dennis would win Formula 2, and spend a couple of years at AlphaTauri (as they were known back then) before he would join the big team in 25! Unfortunately, that never happened as Hauger struggled to capture his true potential in F2, and now he finds himself in Indy NXT! So yeah, not great!
Ferrari: Charles Leclerc and Pierre Gasly
Just let me explain! Ferrari’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton! Charles Leclerc had had a couple of difficult years, his car in 2020 was pretty poor whilst he was simply outperformed by Carlos Sainz in 2021! However, you also knew that Charles was Ferrari’s golden boy, and the idea of him driving anywhere else seemed unthinkable (and I was proven right)! As for his teammate, Pierre Gasly had just had the season of his life, finishing inside the Top 7 in over half of the Grand Prix’s whilst it felt like he would just pop up inside the Top 6 in Qualifying every week for fun! Like, if you thought Pierre was good at the end of 2024, you should go and watch him at his true best! It’s also worth mentioning that at the time, Gasly was driving at AlphaTauri, so it very much felt like he deserved to go back to a top team which is why I put him here, but it hasn’t quite panned out that way as Pierre currently finds himself at Alpine!
McLaren: Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon
Well, this is certainly a lineup! McLaren’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri! At the time, McLaren were nowhere near fighting for Championships, but they also had a healthy gap to the teams behind them! Sergio Perez had just come off the back of his first season at Red Bull, helping his teammate to a World Drivers’ Title whilst also winning in Azerbaijan! Whilst not as high as in 2020, Checo’s stock was still relatively good, especially compared to what it is in the present day, but as we know, Perez to McLaren was never on! As for his teammate, Esteban Ocon was about to enter his third year with Alpine (second if you want to be technical), and he had faired pretty well against Fernando Alonso, of course winning in Hungary being the biggest highlight of all! Now again, this obviously didn’t happen, but at the time, McLaren had a much better car than Alpine and it felt like Ocon deserved better, so whilst this is a crazy Prediction to look back on, it actually made a bit of sense back then!
Alpine: Oscar Piastri and Jack Doohan
Alpine’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Pierre Gasly and Jack Doohan! At the time, Oscar Piastri was Alpine’s Reserve Driver, having won Formula Renault Eurocup, FIA Formula 3, and FIA Formula 2 back-to-back-to-back! It was pretty clear how talented Oscar was which is why it was pretty crazy that he was forced to sit on the sidelines, the only defence to that being the fact that both Alonso and Ocon were driving pretty well. Clearly, Alpine thought the same as me when it came to Piastri taking one of their spots, but that famously didn’t happen and Oscar is now a 2-time Grand Prix winner with McLaren! As for his teammate, Jack Doohan had just come off the back of finishing second in FIA Formula 3, and it felt like he had the potential to make it to F1, it might just take a bit of time! Amazingly, that’s exactly what happened as Jack is driving for Alpine this year, so I’m genuinely very pleased with this pick!
Visa Cash App RB: Juri Vips and Victor Martins
Deary, deary me! AlphaTauri’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Pierre Gasly and Yuki Tsunoda whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar! At the time, Juri Vips was Red Bull’s Test and Reserve Driver, having been with the Academy since 2018! It felt very much like Red Bull liked Juri, I mean he was a former ADAC Formula 4 Champion, and at the time, you only needed one really strong season of F2 to get a shot at AlphaTauri, especially if a seat was available! Ultimately, by the time a seat did become available, Vips had already shot himself in the foot (metaphorically), and his racing career is barely alive as a result! As for his teammate, Victor Martins was the 2020 Formula Renault Eurocup Champion and he’d also managed to finish 5th in his Rookie Formula 3 Season! Victor was also a member of the Alpine Academy, but that roster was already pretty stacked so I thought he would have to move elsewhere in order to get a true shot in Formula 1! The crazy thing about this is whilst this never came true, Martins did go on to win F3 in 2022 so the talent was certainly there! However, as a whole, this is a poor set of Predictions!
Aston Martin: Lance Stroll and Carlos Sainz
Okay, so Aston Martin’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll! At the time, Lance Stroll had come off the back of a decent first year as part of the Aston Martin rebrand, finishing just 9 points behind his teammate, and it was pretty clear that Lance was going to be a part of Aston for a long time to come! As for his teammate, Carlos Sainz was just coming off the back of his first season with Ferrari, a year that saw him outscore his teammate (Charles Leclerc)! Carlos was still yet to win a Race at this point, but his stock was incredibly high so pretty much every team would’ve been happy to have him! For some reason, I didn’t think Ferrari would keep him long-term (something that was sort of proven right), but my pick of Sainz going to Aston Martin didn’t pan out (with Carlos going to Williams instead)!
Williams: Alex Albon and Nyck de Vries
What could’ve been! Williams’ lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Nicolas Latifi and Alex Albon whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz! At the time, Williams were pretty poor, with George Russell’s Podium in Spa (2021) being their own real standout moment since 2017! Alex Albon was returning to the sport after having a year away following a really difficult 2020 Season, and it was very unclear at the time how things would pan out for the young Thai! However, I had faith in Albon hence why I said he’d keep his seat at Williams for the foreseeable future, and that was proven to be correct! As for his teammate, Nyck de Vries was coming off the back of being crowned the first ever ABB FIA Formula E World Champion and he was also serving as Mercedes’ Reserve Driver! Now, at this point in time, Williams very much felt like a secondary team for Merc, they’d run the same engines and would often have their drivers compete for them, so my theory was that that was also going to happen with de Vries! Now, the crazy thing about this is this did happen, with Nyck scoring points for them in Monza of 2022, but de Vries instead moved to AlphaTauri full time and let’s just say that didn’t work out too well!
Kick Sauber: Valtteri Bottas and Theo Pourchaire
Here we go again! Alfa Romeo’s lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto! Alfa Romeo were definitely a backmarker team at the time (not as much as last year though) and Valtteri Bottas was just joining the team after a 5-year stint with Mercedes! Valtteri was super experienced at the time, but he was also a little underappreciated compared to now which is sort of the reason why he found himself at Alfa! I expected Bottas to stay with Alfa Romeo long-term due to his vast levels of experience, but Valtteri didn’t stick around long enough for this Prediction to come true! As for his teammate, Theo Pourchaire was an 18-year-old Frenchman who had all the potential in the world, he was an ADAC Formula 4 Champion, a runner-up in FIA Formula 3, and he’d managed to finish 5th in his first year of FIA Formula 2! It felt almost certain at the time that Theo was going to find himself driving for a team he’d been a part of since 2019, but that obviously didn’t end up happening! It’s worth mentioning that when I wrote these Predictions out, Audi weren’t in the picture whatsoever so that does play a little part in it, but still, this is one I would’ve expected to be right!
Haas: Kevin Magnussen and Yuki Tsunoda
This is a fun one! Haas’ lineup at the start of the 2022 Season was Mick Schumacher and Kevin Magnussen whilst their lineup heading into 2025 is Esteban Ocon and Oliver Bearman! Haas were coming off the back of maybe the worst season I’d ever seen from a single team, and they also had to fire Nikita Mazepin just weeks before the season opener! Kevin Magnussen was brought back to the team after his initial 4-year stint, and K-Mag honestly just felt suited to Haas which is why I thought he’d still be there in 2025. However, I was a year out! As for his teammate, Yuki Tsunoda was just coming off the back of a difficult Rookie year which contained a lot of crashes and a big pace deficit to his teammate (Pierre Gasly)! However, AlphaTauri made the decision to keep Yuki on for another year (whether that was deserved is a debate for another day), and you felt like he had to get better. Now, given Red Bull’s history, I couldn’t see Tsunoda lasting much longer, but he did bring in a lot of backing, and given where Haas were as a team at the time, the idea of Yuki taking his Honda backing to Haas actually made a lot of sense! Of course, that didn’t happen, but I’d like to think that this could’ve been a fun duo!
Andretti: Colton Herta and Logan Sargeant
I did Andretti at the time as both a thought they might join the Grid, but also as a bit of fun, and in fact, this has given me something to talk about! See, Colton Herta was a multiple-time winner in IndyCar at this point, and there were a lot of talks about him joining Alfa Romeo at one point. Later down the line, AlphaTauri were interested in signing him, but a lack of super license points meant Herta was unable to sign for them. What’s interesting about all of this though is the fact that there’s a good chance that Colton might sign for Cadillac next year so I wasn’t a million miles away! As for his teammate, Logan Sargeant had only recently joined the Williams Driver Academy and he was someone that had a good amount of hype given Formula 1 was just starting to become big in America! Logan had had a positive junior career up to this point, particularly in Formula 3, and it felt like him being in Formula 1 at some point was very possible. Now, that did happen as Sargeant was promoted to Williams for the 2023 Season, but we all know his stint in the sport went pretty terribly, meaning any chance of Logan joining Andretti/Cadillac in the future is all but over! However, this was still a fun Prediction, even if it was completely wrong!
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