Indholdsfortegnelse for 31/12/20 i Autosport

It seems strange to be running our Formula 1 season review in the last issue of the year, but lots of things have been out of the ordinary in 2020. As Luke Smith shows on page 70, that F1 managed to get in 17 races is a testament to everyone involved. That was the normal length of a season as recently as the early 2000s – and we’d suggest it is a more sensible number than the 23 being targeted for 2021 (p8). A less compressed schedule would be welcome. Remarkably, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on 13 December is not the latest a world championship event has run. The 1962 showdown in South Africa between Jim Clark and Graham Hill took place on 29 December, Hill dramatically clinching the…

FORMULA 1 The FIA World Motor Sport Council has approved a 23-race calendar for the 2021 Formula 1 season, with Vietnam’s empty April slot still remaining blank. F1 unveiled its provisional calendar for next season in November, listing a record-breaking 23 races as it bids to return to a more regular schedule following the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic through 2020. A new grand prix in Saudi Arabia was added to the calendar, with a night race in Jeddah listed as the penultimate race of the season, while a gap was left in April following the scrapping of the planned race in Vietnam. The new season will start in Australia on 21 March, and finish on 5 December with the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The British Grand Prix will…

OBITUARY Jean Blaton, who has died aged 91, was once described as the “quintessential gentleman driver”. Yet that description doesn’t do justice to a career at the Le Mans 24 Hours that spanned 14 starts, five overall podiums and four class wins. The words were uttered by Jacques Swaters, boss of the Ecurie Francorchamps and Equipe Nationale Belge teams for which Blaton drove in 10 of his Le Mans participations. The partnership yielded all five of his podiums aboard a variety of Ferraris, including the 250 GTO he took to second place in 1963 alongside Gerard Langlois van Ophem. Blaton, who raced under the ‘Jean Beurlys’ pseudonym, was born into a wealthy family involved in construction and was able to indulge his passion for fast cars. He became a customer…

BTCC The British Touring Car Championship’s longest-running partnership between a driver and a team not set up by his own family is at an end. Tom Ingram, 16 times a race winner with Toyotas run by Speedworks Motorsport, and with four consecutive champi0nship top-six positions under his belt, is on the move after seven seasons with the squad. Commercial considerati0ns are at the root of the split, which comes as Speedworks upgrades from a single-car team to two Corollas for 2021. Speedworks boss Christian Dick (below) told Autosport: “When Tom joined us we hadn’t achieved a great deal, and our partnership has been really strong. There’s no animosity, no fallout. The team’s commitments to our commercial partners are growing, and so are Tom’s with his, and it’s been increasingly difficult…

The 2020 Australian Grand Prix was cancelled on 13 March. Nine months later, on 13 December, the season concluded in Abu Dhabi. In between, Formula 1 reorganised an entire calendar, with only nine races from the original keeping their places and just three taking place on their pre-COVID assigned dates. As F1’s regulator, the FIA swung into action “really at the start of April”, F1 race director Michael Masi tells Autosport, to work on a plan to get motorsport going again. It took World Health Organisation guidelines, as well as the advice of epidemiologists and other specialists (safety and risk management regarding sporting events), plus an in-house team of seven to eight people to work on establishing protocols that would enable an F1 season to take place. This team worked…

The COVID-19 pandemic changed so much of 2020. In Formula 1, it swept away the expected calendar, had the teams making incredible contributions to saving lives, and ultimately brought about a consensus that has so often been missing among them. It brought the championship to new tracks and race names, impacted the sporting rules, and had the competitors living in challenging ways. The 2020 F1 season will forever go down as the pandemic campaign, as, we hope, future seasons return to normality given the recent vaccination breakthroughs. But its result was no different to the three before – Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes triumphed. They did so at a canter with a car that took Mercedes away from its traditional silver colours, the W11s painted all black to promote a cause…

10 Lando Norris Down 1 Norris achieved something remarkable in 2020 – he managed to star even while there was no racing to be done as a result of the coronavirus delaying the start of the season. The Briton’s entertaining antics while streaming his virtual racing exploits won him fans and deserved attention, which he used to raise money for the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund when fulfilling a promise to shave his head. When the real racing started, he lived up to the hype and delivered a stunning first F1 podium by taking third in the season opener, charging on the final lap to get close enough to Lewis Hamilton that he could take advantage of the Mercedes driver’s time penalty. That was as good as results got, but he…

In a season where Lewis Hamilton broke the record for Formula 1 wins and equalled Michael Schumacher’s tally of seven titles, there was intense debate about how much dependence there is on the car for success in the sport. With the Mercedes W11 so dominant, many cynics were quick to suggest that Hamilton was only winning because he had the best machinery underneath him. That feeling was perhaps amplified by a season where Max Verstappen, the man who many expected to knock him off his throne, had a Red Bull that wasn’t quite good enough to let him do it. This season was the last chance for Verstappen – already F1’s youngest ever driver and race winner – to become F1’s youngest world champion. And, while there were many Saturday…

Off the back of its recovery to fourth place in the constructors’ championship in 2019, McLaren entered this season braced for a tougher challenge to head Formula 1’s midfield. The emergence of Racing Point’s ‘pink Mercedes’ in Barcelona and a strong showing from Renault throughout testing left some McLaren team members fearing it could drop as low as sixth or seventh in the standings. Yet what followed was the best season in McLaren’s recent history. Rarely did the team have the third-fastest car (on raw pace it was fifth, just behind Ferrari), yet it was able to beat its faster rivals to snare third in the standings, its best finish since 2012. It was further validation for the recovery plan that has been formulating ever since McLaren’s divorce with Honda…

As Pierre Gasly flourished through 2020 and his Red Bull replacement, Alex Albon, encountered similar struggles to his predecessor, momentum gathered for a possible swap back. Gasly said in the wake of his Monza victory in September that he felt “ready” for a return to Red Bull if he got the call, adding: “I guess the strong results should be rewarded with something.” But less than a week after the shock win, Red Bull had poured cold water on the idea, with team principal Christian Horner making clear that the focus was on getting things right with Albon. “I think as far as Red Bull Racing’s seats are concerned, we’re focused on Alex Albon,” Horner said ahead of the next race at Mugello. “It wouldn’t make sense to switch the…

Charles Leclerc 70th Anniversary GP (4th) Either of Leclerc’s drives at Silverstone could have made this list but, although his British Grand Prix podium was the better result overall, the Ferrari driver needed a massive slice of luck to rise from fourth, which he was holding just in front of Daniel Ricciardo. His drive the following week edges it, despite the lack of a trophy, because Leclerc executed a one-stop strategy on tyres that were a step softer, in hotter conditions, on the same demanding track. The 70th Anniversary GP also came two races after Leclerc had struggled to keep his rubber alive in Hungary, but this time he was masterful as the lead one-stopping driver. Leclerc’s drive also featured a recovery, as he lost two places to Lando Norris…

2020 CALENDAR 1 Austrian Grand Prix (Red Bull Ring); 2 Styrian Grand Prix (Red Bull Ring); 3 Hungarian Grand Prix (Hungaroring); 4 British Grand Prix (Silverstone); 5 70th Anniversary Grand Prix (Silverstone); 6 Spanish Grand Prix (Barcelona); 7 Belgian Grand Prix (Spa-Francorchamps); 8 Italian Grand Prix (Monza); 9 Tuscan Grand Prix (Mugello); 10 Russian Grand Prix (Sochi); 11 Eifel Grand Prix (Nurburgring); 12 Portuguese Grand Prix (Algarve Circuit); 13 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix (Imola); 14 Turkish Grand Prix (Istanbul Park); 15 Bahrain Grand Prix (Sakhir); 16 Sakhir Grand Prix (Sakhir); 17 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (Yas Marina). POWERED BY Motorsport Stats is the pre-eminent provider of motorsport data to media owners, rights-holders, bookmakers and sponsors. Its data services are founded on the world’s largest repository of racing results dating back…

CLIO CUP UK There will be no Clio Cup in the UK next year after Renault Sport Racing decided there were too many “uncertainties” to launch a championship – the latest twist in a two-year on/off saga for the category. Back in December 2018, Renault UK announced it would withdraw its support from the popular Clio Cup after the 2019 season, meaning it looked like the end of the road for what was the unofficial feeder series for the British Touring Car Championship. But Renault Sport Racing then revealed that it would back a UK championship for 2020, which would feature the new, fifth-generation Clio and would race on the British GT support bill, rather than alongside the BTCC. However, the coronavirus pandemic led to the start of the season…

MORE BRITISH F4 SIGNINGS Karters McKenzy Cresswell and Thomas Ikin are the latest drivers announced as competing in British Formula 4 next season, with both having already begun a testing programme. British-born, US-raised Cresswell will drive for the JHR Developments squad, while Young Racing Driver Academy member Ikin joins Ginetta Junior graduate Zak Taylor at Arden. SCHOLARSHIP WINNERS Ginetta has chosen two drivers to win its scholarship for the first time, after the Blyton Park final earlier this month was too close to call. Maurice Henry, who has previous junior rallying experience, and Dutch karter Robert de Haan have been selected to receive funded seasons in Ginetta Junior next year. Sixty-five drivers took part in the three-day scholarship event, which featured a range of driving, media and fitness assessments. BRIAN…

Motorsport has changed considerably since 1959 when I persuaded my dad to take me to Brands Hatch to watch my first event, the Kentish 100 Formula 2 meeting. In those days, the calendar was nowhere near as crowded and England was regarded as the epicentre of the sport. Consequently, there were many drivers from overseas among the 45 who turned up to try for one of the 16 places available on the grid. Practice (now called qualifying) was a pretty cut-throat affair, while Jack Brabham (Cooper-Climax) went on to win both races. I managed to get a passable, panned photograph of Stirling Moss in Rob Walker’s Cooper-Borgward despite the fact that I was using a pre-war Goerz camera with leather bellows and a pop-up refraction viewfinder. I was hooked! Drivers…

As the year in which we celebrated Autosport’s 70th birthday comes to a close, it seems appropriate to look back at the last issue of the magazine from its first year. The Christmas double special and Top 50 drivers list were still in the future, but there was a review of the season’s Formula 1 competition on 29 December 1950. “It has been another Alfa Romeo year and the wonderful 1500cc ‘eights’ from Milan, after a year’s absence, have won every 1950 race in which they were entered,” said Assistant Editor Cyril Posthumus. Chief among those successes were the six grands prix that had counted for the inaugural world championship, shared between champion Giuseppe Farina and Juan Manuel Fangio. However, Autosport prophetically noted the “challenge to Alfa’s supremacy” from Ferrari,…

FORMULA 1 Red Bull has signed Sergio Perez for the 2021 Formula 1 season to replace Alexander Albon. After months of weighing up Albon’s future, Red Bull has stepped outside of its own young-driver pool for the first time in 13 years to recruit the Racing Point exile. Perez therefore joins Red Bull on an initial one-year contract to partner Max Verstappen, while Albon will serve as the team’s reserve and test driver next year with a focus on development work for 2022. “All of us wanted to see Alex succeed,” said Red Bull team principal Christian Horner. “What we said was that we would give Alex the season, and not make any decisions before, to have a complete set of data. But when you look at the data, and…

FIA Ex-Force India Formula 1 deputy team principal Bob Fernley has become the new president of the FIA Single Seater Commission. He replaces Stefano Domenicali, who will start his new job as the chairman and CEO of the F1 organisation next month. Fernley was involved with the Ensign F1 team and Indycar racing in the 1980s before becoming a key player at Force India after his close friend Vijay Mallya bought the then-Spyker team at the end of 2007. He left in the summer of 2018 after the team went into administration and was reborn under the Racing Point name. In 2019 he had a brief spell as the head of McLaren’s Indy 500 programme, which ended in frustration when Fernando Alonso failed to qualify. Fernley becomes the fourth president…

WEC Aston Martin has axed its factory assault on the World Endurance Championship for next season and will defend neither its GTE Pro titles nor its Le Mans 24 Hours crown. A manufacturer ever-present in GTE Pro since the rebirth of the WEC in 2012, Aston has opted to “switch the strategic focus of its Vantage GT motorsport programme to concentrate on customer operations”, according to its statement. The decision to call time on the factory race programme with Prodrive follows the takeover of the British manufacturer by Formula 1 team boss Lawrence Stroll and the rebranding of his Racing Point squad as Aston Martin. Aston stated that its success in the 2019-20 WEC meant it had “achieved every target” set for the second-generation Vantage GTE. It said that from…

SUPER FORMULA Naoki Yamamoto has become a three-time Super Formula champion after edging out title rival Ryo Hirakawa in a tense battle during the season finale at Fuji Speedway the weekend before Christmas. Fifth place, one spot ahead of Hirakawa, was enough for Dandelion Racing Honda man Yamamoto to become the first driver to win the Super Formula and Super GT titles in the same year for a second time, following his first ‘double’ in 2018. The race win went to Sho Tsuboi. The Toyota-powered Inging racer outdragged poleman Tomoki Nojiri to Turn 1 at the start and never looked back, becoming the only repeat race winner of the season. Outside title contender Nojiri’s bid had already taken a knock with a slow pitstop before the Team Mugen driver’s hopes…

“L’automobile è femmina”, “the car is a woman”. That’s what Gabriele D’Annunzio, Italian writer in 1920, about the Fiat 4 he had the chance to drive on one of his expeditions. As many of you probably know, nouns in Italian (and other romance languages) have genders. They can either be masculine or feminine. At the time, there was a bit of a debate over the gender of the car; only men could drive it, men had invented it, men took care of the parts, men were the leaders on the iron horse – surely it should be a masculine noun. The French, the original inventors, were calling it a he. But then this letter changed everything: “She has the grace of a woman, the agility of a woman, the charm…

Austrian GP 1 Bottas 2 Leclerc 3 Norris The race at the front is reduced to the Mercedes duo by Verstappen’s power-unit problem, with winner (from pole) Bottas and Hamilton warned to avoid kerbs that were violently shaking their gearboxes. A late safety car lets Albon attack Hamilton, who clips the Red Bull and gets a penalty, boosting the chasing Leclerc and Norris. Styrian GP 1 Hamilton 2 Bottas 3 Verstappen Hamilton hits back after dominating the soaking qualifying session. Verstappen is able to hang around to pose a threat this time, but fades back over the course of the race as Mercedes enjoys its first 1-2 of the year in crushing style. Ferrari’s race is over by the third corner as Leclerc wipes out Vettel. Hungarian GP 1 Hamilton…

Daniil Kvyat produced a strong overall season for AlphaTauri, but his campaign was peppered with regular down days and he struggled to match team-mate Pierre Gasly in qualifying. His high points were great, though, such as his charging drives in the Styrian and Emilia Romagna GPs and on home soil in Russia. Kimi Raikkonen displayed excellent racing skills, as well as producing some brilliant TV moments via his team radio. The Alfa Romeo C39 was held back by the Ferrari engine deficit, which meant Raikkonen was not a consistent points contender. He battled excellently on his finer days, but there were high-profile mistakes too. Antonio Giovinazzi edged team-mate Raikkonen in qualifying and in the number of points finishes he racked up. He took advantage of the chaos of the season…

“The mission is still there and the target is still there to achieve the mission – to win with Ferrari.” Sebastian Vettel spoke those words only nine months ago, during the aborted Australian Grand Prix weekend. At the time, just before the COVID-19 pandemic brought Formula 1 and the world to a standstill, it looked near certain that he would be re-signed to a fresh Ferrari deal and continue striving to achieve his dream: winning in red, just like his childhood hero, Michael Schumacher. But eight weeks later, Vettel’s Ferrari exit was announced, and Carlos Sainz Jr revealed as his replacement. The dream was to end, the mission in mortal peril. This time 12 months ago, Ferrari signed Charles Leclerc to a long-term contract, sealing his place at the team…

The balance between Carlos Sainz Jr and Lando Norris was crucial in clinching McLaren third place, yet neither were regularly at the head of the midfield. Sergio Perez finished 20 points clear of Sainz in the drivers’ standings, with Daniel Ricciardo six points behind the Racing Point man. But had F1 been run without the ‘big three’ of Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari (which scored three podiums, remember), then Ricciardo would have come out on top (see page 57). Norris started the season strongly with ‘victories’ in the two Austria races, but didn’t then top the midfield until Bahrain in November, causing him to lose out in our theoretical title fight. The high points of Ricciardo’s season were the podiums at the Nurburgring and Imola, yet he was already leading…

In four decades as a Formula 1 constructor, the Williams family had controlled the team that bears its name. In that time, founders Frank Williams and Patrick Head oversaw seven drivers’ titles, nine constructors’ championships, and 114 wins. But the team’s 43rd season as an F1 constructor will go down as unique in its long, illustrious history – 2020 was the year the Williams family exited F1. In April, the team announced that it had secured future resources by refinancing its corporate borrowings with loans and the funds from selling its Williams Advanced Engineering division the previous December. But seven weeks later, the news dropped that it had split with its title sponsor and that the partial or full sale of the squad was being considered. The team unveiled a…

As the chequered flag flew at the end of pre-season testing in February, Formula 1 prepared for the opening race in Melbourne with three political battles already brewing. In the space of nine days, controversies had emerged concerning Mercedes, Ferrari and Racing Point that left teams preparing to duel off-track upon touchdown in Australia. But when not a single car took to the track for the season opener and the COVID-19 pandemic surged, it became clear that F1 had a wider, existential battle that required a level of collaboration rarely seen before in the series’ 70-year history. But once it made its welcome return in Austria to kick-start a 17-race season, such unity quickly broke down as the traditional infighting returned through a number of sagas, some of which proved…

The 2020 World Rally Championship bestrode all 12 months of the Gregorian calendar, and in terms of the competition it was a cracker. Moreover, it was an inspiration in dark days for the world and our industry. Britain dared to dream of seeing its first world champion crowned for 19 years but, such was the intensity to the competition, almost everyone had their moment in the sun. It all began back in January, with six-time champion Sebastien Ogier claiming the first stage win in Monte Carlo on his first event for Toyota. Many harboured fears of witnessing another demonstration run for the Frenchman when armed with such a potent weapon as the Yaris, which Ott Tanak had used to finally end Ogier’s sequence of titles in 2019. But on the…

BRSCC The British Racing and Sports Car Club plans to revive the Star of Mallory Formula Ford 1600 contest next season. The title will be awarded across four events at the Leicestershire venue, which will form part of the Northern FF1600 championship. Two of these will be at British Automobile Racing Club meetings, where the clubs will share track time, one will be at a BRSCC event and the other will be at an Aston Martin Owners Club-branded, BRSCC-run fixture. The Star of Mallory will also benefit from a £2000 prize fund supplied by the circuit itself and Daly Systems, while Mallory will run a prize draw at each weekend to win a free test day. “Speaking to a number of Formula Fordsters who are relatively local, there’s a tendency…

BRITISH GT British GT champion Sandy Mitchell will defend his title with Barwell Motorsport next season and has been rewarded with a Lamborghini factory contract. The 20-year-old Scot won two races alongside British Touring Car Championship convert Rob Collard as the Barwell crew beat RAM Racing pair Sam De Haan and Patrick Kujala to the title. On his return to the series he’d first contested as a 16-year-old in 2016, after two seasons in Europe, Mitchell impressed with his pace despite carrying 30kg more ballast than established team leader Phil Keen, who will move to WPI Motorsport next year. Mitchell will now be free of the extra weight running in a Pro-Am line-up with Keen’s former co-driver Adam Balon. “It will be very competitive but I’m really confident that me…

750 MOTOR CLUB 750 FORMULA CHAMPIONSHIP Peter Bove (Darvi Mk4/5) ALFA ROMEO CHAMPIONSHIP Tom Hill (GT) BIKESPORTS CHAMPIONSHIP Charles Hall (Spire GT3) BMW CAR CLUB RACING CHAMPIONSHIP Kevin Denwood (E46 Compact) CLASSIC STOCK HATCH CHAMPIONSHIP Pip Hammond (Vauxhall Nova GTE) CLIO 182 CHAMPIONSHIP Ryan Polley CLUB ENDURO CHAMPIONSHIP Rob Baker/Carl Swift (SEAT Leon Eurocup) F1000 CHAMPIONSHIP Dan Clowes FORMULA VEE CHAMPIONSHIP James Harridge (Maverick) HOT HATCH CHAMPIONSHIP David Drinkwater (BMW Compact) LOCOST CHAMPIONSHIP Murray Shepherd MX-5 CUP Ben Hancy SPORT SPECIALS CHAMPIONSHIP Andy Hiley (Chronos HR1S) SPORTS 1000 CHAMPIONSHIP Ryan Yarrow (Spire GT3S) TOYOTA MR2 CHAMPIONSHIP Aaron Cooke (Mk2) BRITISH AUTOMOBILE RACING CLUB 2CVs Alec Graham BRITCAR ENDURANCE CHAMPIONSHIP Danny Harrison/Jem Hepworth (Praga R1T) BRITCAR TROPHY Oliver Smith (BMW E36 M3) BRITISH TRUCK RACING CHAMPIONSHIP DIVISION 1 Ryan Smith (MAN…

FORMULA 1 Fernando Alonso set the pace for Renault in the final Formula 1 running of the season when he topped the times in the ‘young’ driver test at Yas Marina. After controversy surrounding his inclusion in the test following a late rule change by the FIA, Alonso finished 0.262 seconds clear of Mercedes Formula E driver Nyck de Vries. The Spaniard’s time was faster than Renault’s 2020 F1 race drivers Daniel Ricciardo and Esteban Ocon managed during qualifying for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix a few days earlier. De Vries took second for Mercedes in his maiden F1 test, with his FE team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne ending the day third with Merc upon his return to official F1 action. AlphaTauri new boy Yuki Tsunoda completed more than two race distances…

FORMULA 1 Toto Wolff will remain as team principal of the Mercedes Formula 1 squad for at least three more years as part of a deal in which British chemicals giant INEOS has bought a one-third stake in the operation. INEOS – owned by Britain’s richest man, Sir Jim Ratcliffe – became a principal backer of the Mercedes F1 team back in February, and had been in talks about taking a shareholding for several months. While the company takes a one-third share, Wolff’s own shareholding increases from 30% to 33%. Mercedes parent company Daimler, which formerly held a 60% stake in the squad, will continue to own the remaining third. “When we entered Formula 1 earlier this year, we chose to do so with a Mercedes team that had set…

WRC Former World Rally Championship runner-up Jari-Matti Latvala has become team principal of the Toyota Gazoo Racing squad. With Tommi Makinen stepping down as team boss at the end of the 2020 season to become Toyota’s motorsport advisor, Latvala has been selected by Toyota president Akio Toyoda to replace his fellow Finn. Latvala will “bring a driver’s perspective” to its management team of project director Yuichiro Haruna, sporting director Kaj Lindstrom and technical director Tom Fowler. Toyota also confirmed an unchanged driver line-up of seven-time WRC champion Sebastien Ogier, 2020 runner-up Elfyn Evans and rising star Kalle Rovanpera. “I am really honoured to be taking on this position with the team, and by the trust that Akio Toyoda has shown in me,” said Latvala. “I’m really excited to continue the…

Great drivers need great cars to do great things Rather than devaluing the sport and Lewis Hamilton’s achievements by putting George Russell’s stunning performance in the Sakhir Grand Prix down to the car, can’t we just see it for what it is: a potential champion finally giving the world a chance to show what he can do. The Mercedes is the dominant car, but it also needs a special driver. Lewis is one of the greats, but who is to say that in seasons to come we won’t see Russell in the same light. Mika Hakkinen came into McLaren after years in a poor car and he beat the great Ayrton Senna in qualifying. Was Senna suddenly reassessed and downgraded from legend status? No, Hakkinen’s performance was lauded for what…

The 2020 Formula 1 silly season took an unexpectedly winding path. This time a year ago, Ferrari locked Charles Leclerc down (in the days when that phrase was less negative for most people) to a deal that will keep him in red until at least 2025, with Red Bull then securing Max Verstappen’s services until the end of 2023 just into January. Those moves appeared to restrict the chance of major seat-swapping at the big teams for 2021, but that all changed when Ferrari opted not to continue with Sebastian Vettel. A fresh deal had previously been thought likely. Ferrari quickly moved to announce Carlos Sainz Jr as Vettel’s replacement. This triggered a knock-on impact at McLaren, which signed Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo. A two-month gap occurred before the Australian’s replacement…

Red Bull bounded into the 2020 Formula 1 season full of confidence that it was going to fight for the world championship. A stable set of regulations meant there would be no curveballs like in 2019, when new front-wing rules hindered its prospects with the RB15. There was consistency of engine manufacturer, with Honda hoping to build on the momentum that had delivered the partnership three wins over the previous season. And in Max Verstappen, the team had a maturing superstar who was ready to take on the challenge of becoming a thorn in the side of Lewis Hamilton. To help ensure it hit the ground running with its new RB16, Red Bull also changed the philosophy of how it approached the build-up to the season. Rather than waiting until…

As Sebastian Vettel heads for the exit, there’s no doubt who is Ferrari’s star driver now: Charles Leclerc. In what was a tough third year in Formula 1 for the 23-year-old, given Ferrari’s struggles, he enhanced his reputation with a series of starring drives on his way to eighth in the standings. Next season, he will be joined by Carlos Sainz Jr and together they will embark on the latest chapter in Ferrari’s quest to recapture the glory years it enjoyed most recently – and nearly 20 years ago now – with Michael Schumacher. Great drivers find a way to deliver excellent results in inferior cars, which Leclerc certainly did in 2020. But there were mistakes too. The biggest one came at the start of the Styrian Grand Prix, where…

The glitzy rebranding of Toro Rosso as AlphaTauri ahead of the 2020 Formula 1 season represented the start of a new era for the squad. It should no longer be regarded simply as a B-team to Red Bull Racing, with its foremost task to act as a first step into F1 for the energy-drinks giant’s young drivers. Instead, AlphaTauri was now a ‘sister’ team with a fresh look and higher expectations. In his first full season back at the Faenza-based squad, Pierre Gasly took everything in his stride and delivered the most surprising result in F1 this year. A little over 12 months after his first race back at Toro Rosso following his demotion from Red Bull, he became an F1 race winner in the Italian Grand Prix. And yet…

George Russell and Nicholas Latifi formed Williams’s fifth different driver line-up in five years, with Russell staying on board from 2019. That changed the dynamic for the young Briton, who, before Mercedes drafted him into its line-up for the Sakhir Grand Prix as Lewis Hamilton’s stand-in, was the (relatively) experienced incumbent now paired with a rookie. Russell led the way in qualifying, claiming all of Williams’s prized Q2 progressions and remaining unbeaten against Latifi in the 16 sessions they completed together. But without his Mercedes call-up it is likely that he would have finished behind his team-mate in the final standings, given Latifi’s three 11ths to Russell’s one. Nevertheless, Williams was pleased with what it saw from its returning star, who is set to be back for a third year…

1 Australian Grand Prix cancelled by coronavirus While the coronavirus pandemic dominated global headlines, it made its mark on F1 when the opener was cancelled just hours before the start of practice for the Australian Grand Prix. McLaren initially withdrew after one of its team members tested positive, which led to the cancellation of the event and postponement of the season until July. 2 Sainz replaces Vettel at Ferrari Amid the suspended F1 season, the driver market continued rumbling on as Ferrari signed Carlos Sainz Jr for 2021 and axed Sebastian Vettel. As Sainz left with McLaren’s blessings, the Woking-based team duly swooped for Daniel Ricciardo, leaving Renault to turn to a returning Fernando Alonso. 3 Vettel lands at Racing Point After losing his place at Ferrari, Vettel initially looked short of options…

OBITUARY One of the world’s finest restorers of historic grand prix cars, Tony Merrick died peacefully at his home on 16 December, aged 85, having been diagnosed with aggressive lung cancer only in October. Merrick began restoring the finest cars in 1958 and enjoyed the opportunity to race them from 1960, while preparing ERA R1A, then owned by Sandy Murray. He founded his restoration business in 1972, which provided workmanship to Tom Wheatcroft’s Donington Collection and customers worldwide. His attention to detail and empathy with priceless and often delicate machinery made Merrick a formidable opponent on track. A quiet authority on Ferrari and Maserati, with an avuncular manner and charisma that endeared him to everybody who shared his passion, Merrick was the perfect choice as chairman of the Historic Grand…

BOOK REVIEW TWR’S LE MANS-WINNING JAGUARS RRP £19.99 Prolific motorsport author John Starkey is no stranger to writing about the most revered and influential sportscar racing programmes of all time. Ford versus Ferrari, the Sauber-Mercedes and Nissan Group C attacks, the Lola T70, Porsches 911 and 935 plus the Tour de France roster from Ferrari: they’re all part of the former Donington Park Collection curator’s back catalogue. The latest addition to that growing line-up of volumes comes with TWR’s Le Mans-winning Jaguars. Despite the title and reasonably concise 140 pages, this isn’t a study just of the XJR-9 and XJR-12 designs, which triumphed in the French enduro in 1988 and 1990 respectively. Instead, it’s a comprehensive review of the entire lineage. Starting with the (non-TWR) Group 44 challengers of XJR-5…

The Fiat 131 Abarth of Markku Alen carries the scars accumulated on the 1981 Portuguese Rally, an event in which only a quarter of the starters made it to the finish. Early pacesetter Hannu Mikkola retired when the engine of his Audi Quattro expired, then Ari Vatanen ran his Ford Escort off the road, handing the lead to Alen. Henri Toivonen (Talbot Sunbeam Lotus) chased Alen down, closing to within a couple of seconds before he suffered a broken rear hub, but was able to hold on to second place ahead of Bjorn Waldegard’s Toyota Celica. For classic rally DVDs head to dukevideo.com/rally For more great photographs, visit motorsportimages.com…