F1 2025 Pre-season Preview and Predictions

The F1 2025 season promises to be a thriller for a number of reasons. Considering Lewis Hamilton’s blockbuster move to Ferrari and a competitive field that is expected to be as tight as it was last year, it might be the hardest season to call in years. 

While teams like McLaren and Ferrari look like the early front-runners, the likes of Mercedes and Red Bull Racing have all the ingredients to make it a four-way fight for the championship. Moreover, teams in the midfield are expected to be closer than they were in the last three years of the current set of regulations. 

With the pre-season testing in full swing at the Bahrain International Circuit at the time of writing this, but just over a month out from the Australian Grand Prix, we’ll take you through a few things we think could happen in 2025.

Williams to punch higher up the field

The midfield is expected to be super-tight this season, so I’m not sure if, or how much, Williams will move up in the standings this year but I do expect them to score at more races and to amass more points than in 2024.

One of the main reasons for this will be Carlos Sainz. Sainz is a substantial improvement on the likes of Nicolas Latifi, Logan Sargeant and Franco Colapinto. Without any doubt, Carlos Sainz and Alexander Albon is a phenomenal pairing for a team that finished 9th and even if nothing else changed this alone would be a cause for optimism.

Last year, all three Williams drivers had multiple DNFs. Sainz, on that front, should be steadier and thus reduce or eliminate the problem of funds being diverted from development to producing spare parts, something that hampered Williams throughout 2024. 

The 2025 car is definitely an evolution over last year but it will also have rear suspension two years more advanced (because they ran the 2023 Mercedes gearbox and rear suspension last season). While I’m sure James Vowles, team principal, has a primary focus on 2026 and the new regulations, the 2025 Williams should be much more competitive in the midfield than it was last year.

Verstappen won’t win a fifth consecutive title

For a team that came close to nearly pulling off a clean sweep of wins in 2023, Red Bull alarmingly lost its way with the tricky RB20 last year. Although Verstappen was close to faultless as he consolidated his fast start to secure a fourth consecutive title. With McLaren and Ferrari’s evident advantage on Red Bull, I reckon he won’t win a fifth this time around.

However, it would be foolish to write off Max Verstappen and Red Bull this early into the season. But without the genius of Adrian Newey for the first time in 20 years, Red Bull faces a daunting challenge to reclaim its lost ground now that the momentum has swung to reigning constructors’ champion McLaren and a resurgent Ferrari.

Leclerc will ‘do a Prost’ to McLaren

Back in 1986, Alain Prost swooped in and ‘stole’ the world title as Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet squabbled in the faster Williams. Such a scenario is ripe for repetition, but this time with McLaren finding itself on the other end of the outcome.

The early favourite for the championship appears to be Lando Norris, after learning from his error-strewn breakthrough in 2024. The trouble is, McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri is also in the mix, and in the outwardly laidback Australian there’s a ruthless streak reminiscent of Max Verstappen. 

While both Norris and Piastri are well rounded, their natural competitive instincts make McLaren a potential time-bomb just waiting for a spark. There’s an inevitability that they are likely to fall out at some point. 

That’s why I’m predicting Charles Leclerc as a more likely champion, on the assumption that Ferrari will pick up from where it left off in 2024: both Leclerc and Ferrari scored the most points for drivers and teams from the Dutch Grand Prix onward.

Antonelli and Lawson to score podiums

For all the doubts hanging over new Mercedes rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli, one thing that doesn’t appear to be in doubt is pace. So, as long as Mercedes can provide a competitive car, podium finishes should be a realistic target for the 18-year-old Italian. Whether more is achievable, well that’s a bigger question. 

Antonelli’s rookie status will at least give him some grace to learn – although you never get long to acclimatise in F1, especially in a top team.

Liam Lawson, on the other hand, replaces Sergio Pérez at Red Bull as Verstappen’s team-mate. Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has already stated the Kiwi driver shouldn’t expect to match the Dutchman so the expectation seems to be for Lawson to settle quickly and start scoring consistently to aid the team’s constructors’ campaign.

From what we’ve seen so far, he has the self-belief and resilience to compete alongside one of the greatest drivers of all time. Thus, podiums should be a realistic expectation Lawson will back himself to match.

Fernando Alonso will score multiple podiums

The 2024 season was a real disappointment for Fernando Alonso. The two-time world champion entered the season with lots of optimism after a season that yielded eight podiums but instead he found himself with an unpredictable Aston Martin car that never really looked like it was capable of bringing home any silverware.

Given the kind of money owner Lawrence Stroll is pumping into the team with the new-look management team headed by former Mercedes boss Andy Cowell and which will feature Ferrari’s Enrico Cardile and design genius Adrian Newey. I expect the team to step it up in 2025. 

Contending for race wins or even podiums regularly will be a big ask, but they should make enough of a step that they give Fernando a car worthy of challenging for podiums given the right conditions.  

Ferrari will win the constructors’ championship

Ferrari stepped it up in a big way in 2024. Led by Fred Vasseur – in only his second year in the job – the Scuderia started the year off strongly and then recovered from a mid-season blip to arguably emerge as the best team in the final few races.

It wasn’t quite enough to secure the championship, but their five wins and four poles proved they had what it takes to get the job done.

Their season-long charge – which saw then finish just 14 points shy of the title – was fine reward for a team who were prepared to take more risks and seem to be successfully eradicating a culture of fear that has held them back for so long.

With Charles Leclerc operating at his highest-ever level and the arrival of seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, who will be itching to prove he’s still got what it takes to not just win more races but win a record eighth world drivers’ title, I suspect that devastating combination will take the constructors’ crown back to Maranello for the first time since 2008.