F1 boss criticises FIA ‘downside’ in thrilling 2024 season – With 2025 around the corner, the thrills of the 2024 Formula one campaign are beginning to fade as anticipation builds for the new style project 75 car launch in seven weeks time. To celebrate 75 years of Formula One, this year the teams will abandon their individual car style car launches as they come together for one huge extravaganza at the O2 arena in London on Feb 18th.

Yet before the glitz and glitter of another year in formula One land begins, there is time for reflection on the year that was. On the whole Formula One in 2024 was as exciting as back in 2021, when the drivers’ title was decided on the last lap of the last race of the year.

Seven different drivers won multiple Grand Prix this year, something never before seen in the annuls of F1 history. The title race almost exploded into a titanic battle, but mistakes from McLaren meant Lando Norris was never really close enough to Verstappen to have him worried.

 

 

 

New style FIA under Ben Sulayem

Yet again much of the off track F1 back stories were related to the new style ‘proactive’ FIA under the leadership of Mohammed Ben Sulayem. The year began with the FIA being humiliated as Formula One Management (FOM) decided to oppose the Andretti application to become the eleventh team on the grid. Six months previous, the FIA had green lit the application after months of due diligence and analysis of the prospective new team’s business plan.

The FIA stewards entered the season with a renewed mandate to punish the drivers with harsher penalties for poor driving, the first sig of this was when race officials began issuing ten second in race penalties for offences that were previously awarded five seconds.

The reasoning for this was a consensus that often the five second penalty was little deterrent as a driver would make the calculated decision the time penalty was preferable to having their race ruined by a slower car ahead. Lewis Hamilton was perhaps the most stark of the beneficiaries of the old style five second penalty, when having tipped Max Verstappen into the wall in Silverstone 2021, he received a five second penalty yet went on to win the race.

Yet there were unforeseen driver responses to the tougher sanctions being handed out as Kevin Magnussen demonstrated in Saudi Arabia when he driver so slowly holding up his competitors that he created a gap ahead for his team mate to make a pit stop but return ahead of the gaggle of cars headed by his team mate.

Ex-Ferrari boss critical of the FIA

 

 

 

Season declared a triumph by pundits

However, the relationship between the drivers and the FIA deteriorated to such an extent over the year, that the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association penned an open letter to F1’s governing body demanding transparency over finances and that the race officials stop treating them like naughty children.

Speaking on the end of season podcast Formula For Success David Coulthard and former team owner Eddie Jordan discuss the highs and losses of the year with the former McLaren driver eulogising over the action seen by the fans this year.

“I think F1 2024 was pure, dead brilliant,” he said. “We don’t have to go into all of the reasons why, but it delivered for me as a fan. What about you?”

Jordan who has battled prostate cancer this year was critical of the FIA who he claimed for 2024 had been a “downside.” He highlighted the row created by president Ben Sulayem in which the drivers were accused of swearing like “rappers.”

Surprising driver selections by team bosses

 

 

 

Verstappen made an example

The following clamp down by the FIA stewards saw Max Verstappen issued with a special ‘community service’ type punishment for using the F-bomb in an FIA approved media event. Lewis Hamilton urged his fellow driver to defy the FIA, while Lando Norris also present said the punishment was “just wrong.”

Yet when all was said and done, a day with motor racing fanatical kids in Rwanda appeared to be a solution to the problem which Verstappen in fact quite enjoyed. As to the pure excitement of the season, Jordan explained it had been peaking some time before the brilliance on display in Sao Paulo.

“I think we made reference to that even long before Brazil. And then Brazil brought it to another level in terms of excitement, intrigue, not knowing,” Jordan said in response to Coulthard.

“Yes, of course, there were some downsides. And we talked about where the role is of the FIA, where the role is of the drivers and situation and behaviour generally, when you’ve got younger listeners. So there is a balance somewhere to be required in that.

“However, I’m not sure I remember a year as good in the recent past that could surpass ’24, it was fantastic.”

Tsunoda ditched

 

 

 

Driver sit down with FIA of driving standards

Jordan admits since 2021, the competition in F1 has been less than fierce before this season, “And believe it or not, it got my juices jumping again. I wanted to watch all of the grands prix. I wanted to watch the build-up.

“And that is indirectly why I’m so excited about it, because ’24 was not a personally great year for me, but I didn’t flinch, and I wanted to make sure that I would do each and every one of these shows.

“And I’m so pleased and proud that I did.”

The drivers have agreed a sit down with representatives of the FIA to thrash out the driving standards guidelines for the stewards issued secretly annually by F1’s governing body. There will be a huge debate around the current interpretation of ‘who has the right to the corner’ following the exposure of its weaknesses by Max Verstappen during the season.

Horner surprised by Perez comments

 

 

 

Verstappen exploits the limits

In Austin Texas, Max had been overtaken by Norris along the back straight but by braking later, the worlds champion reached the apex first giving him the right to the corner. The subsequent pushing Norris wide and off the track on the exit was adjudicated by the stewards to be within the guidelines for the rules and in fact it was the McLaren driver who was penalised for overtaking off the circuit.

In whatever form the new guidelines appear, motor racing is not a black and white sport despite the efforts by the FIA to make the white lines delineating track limits absolute. The greatest drivers in F1 history all come to know the regulations inside out and in the heat of battle can make a clear decision how best to deal with combat in that split second.

Verstappen will be the same whatever the outcome of the sit down. Its up to the rest of the field to know the rules as well as Max and deploy the accordingly when fighting with the world champion for track position. 

Marko: Lawson has “no chance” against Verstappen

 

 

 

Vasseur dismisses Verstappen’s bold Ferrari claim

In a year when Formula One gave its supporters one of the most competitive seasons of all time, the chase for the drivers’ championship fizzled out like a firework in the monsoon of Interlagos. Never before has F1 seen seven different drivers win multiple races in a season as the sport prepares to celebrate its 75th season in 2025.

The anniversary will spawn a whole host of one off Formula One events across the world yet what matters to the ordinary fan is how competitive is the racing on track. The signs are good, Red Bull clearly did not have the fastest car when the sport returned from the summer break and Max had his longest win drought since 2020.

Yet it was written in the stars, the four times world champion would find a way to remind his fellow drivers why he remains the one to beat. Following skirmishes with the stewards in Singapore and Mexico, Max arrived in Sao Paulo with multiple points to prove… READ MORE