Ferrari raise the bar and other talking points from the 2017 F1 season

Sport360 staff 22:23 27/11/2017
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  • Valtteri Bottas became the final winner of this year’s Formula One season after he held off Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Sunday.

    The 28-year-old Finn, who started from pole position, led from the lights to the flag apart from a spell following his first pit stop when Hamilton was in control.

    Hamilton claimed his fourth world championship with two races to spare after he took an unassailable lead over Sebastian Vettel in Mexico last month.

    Here, Press Association Sport looks back at five things we learned from the 2017 campaign.

    What was your highlight from the season?

    Let us know on our Twitter and Facebook pages.

    Ferrari raise the bar… but Vettel faltered

    The season may have ended in a rather underwhelming fashion, but that should not detract from what has been a strong year.

    Ferrari raised the bar and in Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel the sport finally witnessed the two greatest drivers of their generation going toe to toe for the first time.

    For much of the year it looked as though the championship would go down to the wire with the season swinging from Mercedes to Ferrari and Hamilton to Vettel only for the latter’s charge to capitulate in the Far East.

    Hamilton acted like a man reborn following the departure of his long-term foe Nico Rosberg, and while Vettel crumbled under the pressure in Baku (penalised for deliberately swerving into Hamilton), Singapore (crashed out from pole) and Mexico (damaged his car after a first-lap collision with Hamilton), his rival delivered his fiercest performances when it mattered most.

    Hamilton’s qualifying lap at a rain-soaked Monza – where he was more than one second faster than anyone else – and victories at five of the six races staged after the summer break cleared his path to glory.

    But with only minor tweaks to the regulations over the winter, expect Hamilton and Vettel to do it all over again in 2018.

    Sebastian Vettel.

    New owners under pressure

    Liberty Media promised to revolutionise F1 following their £6.4billion purchase in January and swift removal of the long-standing Bernie Ecclestone from its helm.

    But aside from improving F1’s reach on social media (albeit from a starting point of zero) it is a sport largely untouched from Ecclestone’s days in charge.

    A 13 per cent drop in the prize money pool (some £32million) for the first time in recent memory has done little to endear the new regime to the teams, while the new logo, unveiled after the season finale in abu dhabi, courted disdain rather than pleasure.

    Liberty’s vision for the future is also unclear which is becoming a growing source of frustration for most of the teams.

    “If you look at this year we have accomplished a significant amount,” Sean Bratches, F1’s American commercial boss, argued ahead of the season finale.

    “This is a journey and not a destination. We have great aspirations for this sport. You don’t flick a switch and things happen. I can assure you we are going 24/7 and working to make this sport as great as it can be because we believe there is a huge opportunity.”

    Nowhere for McLaren to hide in 2018

    Glasses of champagne were shared between members of McLaren and Honda on Saturday evening as they toasted the final race of a partnership which has been doomed from the start.

    It was hardly a surprise to see the broader smiles were on the faces of McLaren personnel rather than those from the Japanese manufacturer.

    This has been a torrid three years for both parties, but McLaren, who will be powered by the more competitive Renault outfit next year, will now hope to finally turn a corner.

    The famous British team, a winner of 20 world championships, has hidden behind Honda’s failings for too long and in 2018 it will be time for them to deliver.

    What next for Ricciardo?

    Daniel Ricciardo has emerged as one of the sport’s most likeable figures – thanks in part to his so-called ‘shoey’ celebration in which he, or an invited guest, swigs champagne from his sweaty race boot.

    But despite finishing ahead of his team-mate Max Verstappen in the championship, Red Bull have made it clear that it is their intention to build the team around the 20-year-old Dutchman.

    Aside from Hamilton, who is due to pen a new deal with Mercedes, Ricciardo is the major player out of contract at the end of next season.

    With Mercedes and Ferrari circling, it will be fascinating to see where the Australian ends up.

    The future is in safe hands

    While question marks remain over the sport’s owners, the future of Formula One, in terms of its on-track quality at least, appears more certain.

    Verstappen, who turned only 20 last month, put reliability woes from the opening half of his campaign to one side to record two impressive victories in the latter stages of the season, while 21-year-old Esteban Ocon has thoroughly impressed in his first full term in the sport.

    There is British interest for the future, too, with Lando Norris, 18, signed up as a McLaren reserve driver for next season after winning the European Formula Three championship, while George Russell, the 19-year-old Englishman who sealed the GP3 title this year, impressed on his recent practice run-outs with Force India.

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