2021 Season Before It Starts

F1 2021 season is ever so close from its first weekend which will be proceeding from, 26th-28th of March. Everything looks to be smooth & under control compared to 2020, by this time last year everything looked good nonetheless it all went downhill very quickly. As of now F1 seems to be more prepared and aware about all the uncertainties that might come by while travelling around the globe visiting 23 different cities. F1 personnel have a high chance of getting infected by Covid-19 virus, to avoid that many are expected to get vaccinated before they leave for pre-season test in Bahrain but obviously not everyone will be prioritized over people that actually need the vaccine. So, Bahrain Health Ministry has stepped in and is offering Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination to all F1 personnel upon arrival into the country. The Pre-season test and first race are held at Bahrain International Circuit which means all the teams would arrive in Bahrain by 08th of March and would stay until the end, which suggests they will have enough time to take first dose on arrival and second dose after 21 days while leaving the country. It’s really nice to see the GP Organizers are so proactive, even last year they agreed to have 2 events and even after Romain Grosjean’s fatal accident they managed to replace few split barriers and had a banger of a show that weekend *simply lovely*.

Livery Season

Even if the 2021 season is yet to begin the Livery season is almost done and dusted, with some renamed teams, a lot of driver transfers. Now before we start saying things I would like to say yes I know there are a lot of people who worked hard and have given their time to make those things and I really appreciate and respect them for it.

• Starting off with Mercedes livery the reigning world champions’ that AMG sticker bomb is ugly, to be fair a week prior to launch when they displayed some digital renders of black shifting to white, I expected a lot from them, it looked brilliant—but AMG had different plans. 

• Red Bull’s Livery remains unchanged but I won’t complain about it—that is one good looking car & I can see why they haven’t changed it for so long, they want to make it one of the iconic liveries of all time.

• Even McLaren remains unchanged for most of the parts, I expected a lot given they were the only team who actually evolved their livery year after year the shift from 2018-2020 was visible and really good but as majority of the car is carried over into 2021, they would want to have a fresh new look for new regulations approaching in 2022.

• The James Bond car Aston Martin F1 team are one of the renames changing from BWT Racing Point, I can see their approach to British Racing Green they played it very safe and I can see all the British fans going crazy about Green car, Silverstone based team, British team and its exciting to see it but I feel they could have done a better job to convince BWT to not fool around and have some sort of pink implementation, adding to that I never thought I would ever be complaining about the driver numbers ever—but boi those AM numbers are very odd looking those are definately worth some critics.

• Alpine is another renamed team coming from Renault F1 team, I feel they have the best livery on the 2021 grid, its beautiful they’ve got Saturn blue finish, studio shots look brilliant but that car is going to look crazy under floodlights of Bahrain, Singapore and Abu Dhabi.

• Though Ferrari hasn’t unveiled their 2021 challenger yet, but what do I expect from them, it’s a Ferrari it’s going to be a red car and they will slap a bunch of monochrome sponsors, no shades no shapes no lines running across the car whatsoever, and that will be it. 

• Alpha Tauri is another lovely car they kind of reversed it and it really is much better than last year, I didn’t expect such a major change given their Toro Rosso days but—wow.

• Alfa Romeo is another work of art looks much better, kind of asymmetrical but still a banger of a livery definitely in the top 3, same process reversed the colors again didn’t expect that major shift given their line of ehh looking livery since they joined.

• Williams ‘what a donkey looking car’ that’s the only thing I could think of them, there has to be some sense behind using 3 shades of blue on top of that they used golden yellow lines, white and black. There is too much happen on that car it really feels like someone at Williams fooled around on F1 2020 my team mode—that isn’t the livery you make after the initial 2020 Rokit livery even the actual 2020 livery was decent they could have done something with that and still would have been better then that ugly thing. 

• Haas turned out to be a bit of surprise to be honest, with the color scheme they choose, so everyone has their take on Haas’ approach, everyone is bashing them for sporting a Russian Flag under their multi-year deal with Title Sponsor Uralkali which again is owned by Pappa Mazepin, I would be lying if I said that livery isn’t one good looking, it’s absolutely spot on—yes I am not denying that is a controversial take but come—on what else to expect from a Russian brand.

F1 Safety Cars

While that’s all for design side of F1 teams, one interesting change of 2021 was Safety Cars, last year it was confirmed that both Aston Martin & Mercedes will be providing Safety Cars and Medical Car for 2021 season alternatively at race events—turns out they had different plans.

F1 Safety Car

Aston Martin Vantage & DBX

• The racing green Vantage Safety Car is powered by a 4.0l twin-turbo V8 engine, managing 0-60mph in 3.5 seconds and has undergone suspension and aero modifcations to make sure it can lead a pack of 20 F1 cars at sufficient speed to keep tyre temperatures adequate.

• The DBX Medical Car will reach 0-60mph in 4.5 seconds with 550PS and 700NM of torque from the same engine as the Vantage, with defibrillator, fire extinguishers and a burn kit to respond to medical emergencies.

Mercedes AMG GT R & C 63 S Estate

Mercedes, who have supplied the official Safety Cars since 1996 (and are sharing Safety Car appearances for the first time since then), have a new look this season with their AMG GT R Safety Car and C 63 S Estate Medical Car both dressed in red which comes from Mercedes F1’s sponsor crowdstrike which is an American cybersecurity technology company based in California. It provides endpoint security, threat intelligence, and cyberattack response services to the F1 team and now has extended their partnership into the AMG Performance brand.

• The AMG GT R has a 4.0l biturbo V8 and can reach 0-62mph in 3.6 seconds.

• While the C 63 S Estate is modified with FIA-spec medical equipment, as is the DBX.

Bernd Maylander will pilot both Aston Martin and Mercedes' Safety Cars, with Alan van der Merwe taking the wheel of the Medical Cars.

Formula 1 : Drive To Survive

Third season of a very successful and enjoyable flip side of a sport never seen before is about to released in a week’s time. Yes, Formula 1 : Drive To Survive will be back on 18th March and Netflix and Formula 1 has also agreed to continue the show for 2021 season. If anyone doesn’t know what is Drive To Survive, then let me help you out. It is a web series which includes recap of what happened throughout the season on track and things which aren’t showed on TV—yes, Behind The Scenes. All the business, all the banter, everything well documented and includes almost all the driver’s, team principle, F1 personnel. It always turns out to be a banger as Netflix does it’s magic and dramatizes/ spices up things on top of that 2020 was no less then a chaotic season so much happened in the span of 17 races, just can’t wait to seen how it unfolds behind the scenes.

Netflix F1 Drive To Survive

Le Champagne

Ferrari Trento has been named as the official Sparkling Wine of F1 in a partnership that will last for the next three years. Bottles of the Italian company's sparkling wine will be used on the podiums after each race and its products will be available in F1's Paddock Club and other official venues. It is not the first time that Ferrari Trento wine has featured on the podium with its products having been used on the podium at the Italian Grand Prix in the past.

While F1's podium ceremony has traditionally used champagne, it has not been used exclusively throughout its history. After several decades of using Moet and Mumm champagne after races, sparkling wine producer Chandon was used on the podium from the start of 2016. However, midway through the 2017 season, F1 announced an official tie-up with champagne producer Carbon.

F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali said he had no qualms about the sport breaking with tradition and committing to a new sparkling wine deal over champagne. Asked why the sport had decided on the switch, he said: "The answer is very simple: it is the quality of the product and the quality of the company. This is the reason why our relationship has developed. "Domenicali hoped that the Ferrari Trento deal could open the doors for the sport trying out something different with the podium ceremonies in the future too. Recently, F1 has experimented with using GoPro cameras on the champagne bottles to try to offer a unique view of the podium ceremonies as they happened. "I want to make sure that with Ferrari Trento, being such an exceptional Italian product, I would like this celebration to be somehow different," he said. With alcohol not used on the podium for the races in the Middle East, the first podium that will feature Ferrari Trento will be the Imola race in April.

Ferrari Trento Official F1 Sparkling Wine

Tighter Mid-Field

Now that we know what will be used to celebrate up on the podium, lets talk about who will get be on podium to taste it. The way 2020 season ended was crazy the fight for P3 in the championship boiled down to the final race and to be fair the stars aligned perfectly in favor of McLaren, Perez retired in that race both McLaren boys finished P5 & P6 bringing home 18 Points and claiming P3 in constructor’s championship with mere 7 points lead. BWT Racing Point was clearly the fastest in the mid-field they even won a race and couple more podium finishes then McLaren managed to get. The reason they couldn’t finish P3 would be the 15 points penalty given to the team for the whole controversy of copying the 2019 Mercedes—which I believe is well deserved but on top of that not both of their drivers managed to score points on consistent basis, while the battle for P3 wasn’t only between McLaren & Racing Point even Renault was looking quick to fight for that spot but the returning Esteban Ocon was having an awful season and couldn’t find his pace while Danny Ric was smashing bejesus out of R.S.20. there were 2 more teams hungry and were looking fierce to challenge for at least P4 to P6 in the championship which were Alpha Tauri & Ferrari. While Ferrari had and disappointing engine output which often led to knockouts in Q3’s & Q2’s, Charles Leclerc managed to put that car way ahead then its limits on Sundays. Same was the story of Alpha Tauri Piere Gasly was always punching above AT01’s weight—even managed to win teams Home Grand Prix at Monza. That was the story of 2020 season, Ferrari meanwhile has reportedly improved their engine problems for 2021 season and will be looking forward to finish P3 in championship, Alpha Tauri are willing to put a few more points on the board and fight the likes of Alpine, McLaren, Aston Martin and Ferrari which means there will be less room for blunders for all of them. The more pressure a team feels the more opportunities other 4 teams have and the more entertaining it gets for the fans. The main question which obviously stands at every pre-season test is can Red Bull take the fight to Mercedes and end their successful era. Now because majority of the cars are carried over into 2021 there is a less chance any team would go backwards in terms of performance and it is safe to say we will have a super tight fight in the mid-field, even though teams like McLaren and Aston Martin would look forward to fight the likes of Red Bull and maybe challenge for podiums but that’s not going to happen of regular basis. Few hiccups from Mercedes and Red Bull would definitely benefit McLaren and Aston but I feel that would be it.

Or would it turn out any different than that? As Both McLaren and Aston Martin will be using the Mercedes powered cars will they beat Red Bull at certain event’s fair and square? Well few things can't be answered before the season gets underway, F1 is a sport where every 10th of a second counts and makes huge difference, so let's wait and see what 2021 season hold for us.