Conor Walsh | Staff Writer
Given the year that’s in it, it’s not surprising to find high class international sport appearing on our television sets with increasing regularity. On the Sunday the Winter Olympics ended, and BBC had concluded its coverage with their achingly long montage of highlights from the previous two weeks, there immediately appeared a most fascinating documentary on the 1976 Formula One season charting the rivalry between James Hunt and Niki Lauda; a season portraying the swashbuckling, charismatic Hunt and tactically proficient, robotic Lauda, in an era of rip-roaring and hazardous racing which even saw the latter lose half of his right ear in a life-threatening crash at the Nurburgring.
In some ways this coming Formula 1 season may echo the vibe that famous season. Along with the now familiar radical rule changes there is also a collection of top quality drivers in the sport competing for the championship this year, with many constructors also throwing their hat in the ring, giving this season the potential to be the most exciting for years.
Formula 1 is unique in that it undergoes more rule changes each year than a schoolyard game of five-a-side football. This year is no different. As part of Bernie Ecclestone’s grand plan to make F1 appear more green, environmentally aware and, most importantly, commercially attractive, the cars’ power units have been radically reduced to 600BHP, 1.6L turbocharged V6s (from the normally aspirated 2.4L V8s in use since 2006) and include a new Energy Recovery System (ERS) to replace KERS, which will provide an extra 160BHP for 33 seconds per lap. This will lead to slower top speeds in the straights.
Other significant changes include an increase in the minimum weight of the car to 690kg, 48kg more than last year, the advent of double points for the final race of the season and the return of in-season testing. Pirelli remain as the sole supplier of rubber for 2014 and will be hoping to avoid the negative press garnered last year from their tyres’ lack of durability. Elsewhere, F1 visits Russia for the first time, while the circus returns to Spielberg in Austria for the first time since 2003.
The Mercedes team are among the top challengers for this year’s crowns.
After Hispania left the parc fermé for the last time in 2012, there is still yet to be a replacement for the former minnows; the number of teams sits at eleven. Nevertheless, the current crop of teams appears intent on providing as much entertainment as ever before with winter testing providing enough drama to whet the appetite of the petrol-headed F1 fan. If recent developments are anything to go by current constructor champions Red Bull look to be the most high profile casualty of the new specification tweaks, with reliability issues blighting their efforts in Bahrain and Jerez over the winter. Consistent performances from Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg on the other hand currently have Mercedes installed as the favourites for the title this year. It looks like Ross Brawn has finally got the recipe right for the German marque who has struggled to capitalise on his debut season success in 2009. Ferrari too have had a fruitful testing period and could yet challenge for honours this year. Williams will be encouraged by unfamiliar pace in testing and Felipe Massa topping the standings in Bahrain while McLaren have hardly put a foot wrong save for the last day of testing in Sakhir.
It is looking more and more like a Ferrari-Mercedes shootout, but it is impossible to rule-out current champions Red Bull, despite a woeful teething period with their new car. It will be a long season and, as in-season testing returns, it will be case of how well each team evolves over the course of the year; this may favour the Austrian giants over the other teams due to the vast sums at their disposal.
Sebastian Vettel is the reigning champion coming into this season
What of the men behind the wheel? The most notable transfer of the winter was arguably Kimi Raikkonen’s return to Ferrari, teaming up with Fernando Alonso; a somewhat surprising move given the Italians’ history of not matching drivers of equal ability. Should the two drivers drive consistently they could deliver Ferrari their first constructors’ crown since Kimi’s success in 2008, with either of the two starting as contenders the top step. Felipe Massa was finally thrown out of Maranello and joined ranks with Williams, alongside Valtteri Bottas, leaving human car-crash, Pastor Maldonado, to join Lotus, teaming up with fellow occupational hazard Romain Grosjean at the expense of Paul di Resta. Elsewhere at Red Bull, Australian Daniel Ricciardo was promoted from Toro Rosso to the big leagues and, if his drives with the lesser of the Red Bull teams are anything to go by, puts him as an outside chance for the world title, if Red Bull sorts out their reliability issues and the manufacturer supply him with a similar car to his German teammate. The current world champion has already raised concerns over his team’s ability to challenge this year after disastrous testing, however his titles coupled with the ease with which the majority of them were attained means one can’t rule out Vettel for top honours this season; his four consecutive titles say more than enough as it is.
It remains, on paper, the most open championship for some time. Alonso and Raikkonen at Ferrari and Hamilton at Mercedes performing in pre-season are surely the forerunners for the title based in their solid winter. Despite his somewhat negative rhetoric regarding their current car it is impossible to believe that Red Bull won’t feature. As for the dark horse of this championship, the encouraging pace of Felipe Massa in Bahrain might propel him to long-awaited glory, but, as Juan Montoya showed in his Williams in 2001, pace minus cornering skill will inevitably equal failure. The winning driver this year then will be the one who can master the cars’ performance and not fret under the pressure, much like F1’s halcyon days of Lauda and Hunt. As for who that will be, the form book suggests Raikkonen, Alonso or Hamilton. Despite everything aforementioned, winter testing can be a poor predictor of race outcomes, so choosing a winner from the current batch is like picking winning lotto numbers.
