The 2024 Formula 1 season turned into one of the most competitive contests the championship has produced in years – but it didn’t start that way.
Over the opening races it seemed Red Bull and Max Verstappen were going to pick up where they left off at the end of their dominant 2023 campaign. He began the season by equalling Ayrton Senna’s all-time record for most consecutive pole positions, taking eight from the final race of last year to round seven at Imola. Senna’s equivalent record spanned the 1988 and 1989 seasons. Verstappen also matched, but did not beat, Alain Prost’s 1993 record of taking pole positions at the start of a championship.
As Verstappen’s prodigious winning rate over the previous seasons continued into the start of this year, it briefly propelled his career winning rate ahead of F1’s most successful driver of all time – his 2021 championship rival Lewis Hamilton, who was enduring by far the longest dry spell since he became a grand prix driver when the year began.
At the second round of the year Red Bull equalled Williams’ tally of 114 victories. In the 20-year spell since Red Bull entered F1, Williams have only taken a single win. Red Bull soon passed them to become the fourth most successful F1 team of all time in terms of wins.
But then it all changed. Verstappen’s winning rate tailed off after Imola, then following his Spanish Grand Prix victory he went 10 races without winning – his longest win-less run since 2020. At the United States Grand Prix, his winning rate dipped back below Hamilton’s, despite the Mercedes driver spinning out of an F1 race for the second time in his 300-plus grand prix career that weekend. However Verstappen moved back ahead before the end of the season.
As Red Bull’s rivals closed the gap it created opportunities for others to win. In Australia, where Verstappen suffered his only retirement of the year due to a technical failure, Carlos Sainz Jnr took victory for Ferrari. He missed the previous race when he had emergency appendix surgery, and he became the first driver to win after missing a race since Gerhard Berger in 1997.
Ferrari’s next win came in Monaco courtesy of a delighted Charles Leclerc, who ended his luckless run in his home race. It was the first time the Monaco Grand Prix had been won by a home driver since the world championship began. The tiny principality on the French riviera therefore became the 13th nation to have a home winner in F1.
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The Monaco Grand Prix has been a processional affair and this year’s was certainly not one for the ages. A first-lap red flag allowed the field to complete their mandatory tyre changes without pitting, and the competitors circulated dully thereafter, ticking off the laps as Leclerc managed his pace in the first grand prix ever to feature no position changes among the top 10.
McLaren also started winning, which certainly came as a relief to Lando Norris. Heading to the Miami Grand Prix he had increased the record for most podiums without a victory to 15. By winning in Miami he returned that record to a no-doubt-less-than-thrilled Nick Heidfeld, who made 13 podium appearances but never stood on the top step.
Norris tied with Verstappen for most pole positions over the season, each taking eight. But Verstappen could have had three more very easily: He lost poles due to penalties at Spa (engine change) and Losail (impeding) and set the same time as Canadian Grand Prix pole-winner George Russell, only missing the top spot because he did it after the Mercedes driver. This was the 16th occasion when two F1 drivers have shared the pole-winning time in qualifying, but only the second instance in the last 50 seasons due to the introduction of timing to three decimal places.
Verstappen knew a championship threat coming when he saw one and gave Norris a hard time when they fought for victory in the Austrian Grand Prix, eventually causing a collision. That opened the door for a fourth different team to win, George Russell taking victory for Mercedes. By the end of the year those four teams had won at least four races each, setting a new record.
Despite retiring his damaged McLaren in Austria, Norris was still classified, along with every other driver, for the second race in a row. That occured twice during 2024 – the Bahrain Grand Prix also completed back-to-back events in which every driver was classified – a feat never seen before this year.
Finally, at Silverstone, Hamilton claimed his first win since late in 2021. He had previously never gone 10 rounds without winning a race, but his British Grand Prix victory came after 56 starts. Of course, many other drivers have to go their entire careers without wins, notably Nico Hulkenberg, who broke Andrea de Cesaris’ 30-year-old record for most starts without a victory in April. As of the season’s end, Hulkenberg has increased that record from 208 starts to 227, and has moved to the team which ended this year in last place, so his prospects of ending the run do not look good.
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Hamilton added a second win later in the year, at Spa, though Russell won ‘on the road’. He became only the sixth driver in the history of the world championship to be disqualified after winning.
Two drivers claimed their first wins in 2024. The second was Oscar Piastri in Hungary, which made his McLaren team the first since Williams in 2001 to see both their drivers take their maiden victories in the same season.
As a result, 13 different grand prix winners lined up on the grid at the Belgian Grand Prix, the most since the 1980 Canadian Grand Prix, though that was on a larger, 24-car grid.
Two of those winners disappeared before the end of the season. Alpine benched their only grand prix winner, Esteban Ocon, with one race to go, though he will return with Haas next year. However Daniel Ricciardo reached the end of the line at the Singapore Grand Prix, where he became the fifth driver in F1 history to set the fastest lap in their final race – though that detail was only confirmed four days after the chequered flag fell.
Another driver who lost their seat mid-season was Logan Sargeant. He became the fourth consecutive American driver to race in F1 but lose their seat before the end of the year, following Alexander Rossi, Scott Speed and Michael Andretti, over a period covering more than three decades.
More of Verstappen’s rivals took advantage of their chances to pick up wins in the second half of the season. When Russell finally got his second win of 2024 in Las Vegas, seven different drivers had become multiple winners, breaking the record of six set in 1981.
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The distribution of wins between other drivers helped Verstappen clinch the title, aided by his victory from 17th on the grid (with two empty slots ahead of him), the lowest starting position a race had been won from since Kimi Raikkonen in the 2005 Japanese Grand Prix. No driver who has won three championships in a row has ever failed to add a fourth, and Verstappen sustained that precedent set by Juan Manuel Fangio, Michael Schumacher, Sebastian Vettel and Hamilton.
However, for only the 12th time in F1 history, the constructors’ championship was won by a team which did not feature the title-winning driver. McLaren clinched the title with their sixth win of the year – the fewest victories achieved by the championship winners in 25 years.
set a new record for the longest gap between consecutive constructors’ title wins with their first for 26 years – their last win in 1998 came before either of their current drivers were born. Ferrari are now in the longest title-less drought of their F1 history, having not won the constructors’ crown since 2008 when, ironically, the drivers’ title went to McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton.
Over to you
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