Johnny Herbert: Is Red Bull beatable? Damn right it is’

What am I looking forward to from Formula 1 in 2023? Restructuring Ferrari will be a big talking point, clearly. I’m very sad Mattia Binotto has gone; I liked him. He had an understanding of what and how things needed to be done. But as I said in a previous column, the summer break was his opportunity to address the team’s issues – and he chose not to do that. It got to a point where it seemed the engineer and driver were making the calls on strategy. I heard by the end that he and Charles Leclerc weren’t even talking.

There were rumours of Frédéric Vasseur coming in from Alfa Romeo. My old contacts at Sauber said it looked like he would be on the move, prior to Mattia stepping down. By the time you are reading this you might know who has got the job. If it is Vasseur, the team needs someone like him, who has respect and experience of running teams: his demeanour fits Ferrari.

As race fans, we want to have Ferrari in the mix – and the same goes for Mercedes. I’ve heard mixed things from the end of the year in Abu Dhabi. On the one hand, that it still didn’t fully understand the porpoising issue, yet on the other hand that the opposite is true. Let’s hope it’s the latter! We want to see continued brilliance from George Russell, while there were still signs that Lewis Hamilton hasn’t lost it. You’d hope that a restructuring of the concept at Mercedes has been implemented from what it has learnt.

Red Bull is still going to be strong and whatever you think of the aerodynamic limitation penalties the team received for the budget cap overspend, it’s probably not going to hurt it overall as much as the problems Ferrari and Mercedes have got. Red Bull will still be the target to topple. Is it beatable? Damn right it is, as Ferrari showed early on last season, as did Mercedes at altitude.

George versus Lewis in a competitive Mercedes would be a juicy prospect, two Brits going at it with a seven-time world champion aiming for his eighth against a young driver gunning for his first. George will make life difficult again for Lewis. We certainly haven’t seen the best of George yet. He will improve and get stronger because he will mature. He seems to have the right mentality, even politically within the team. He’s not a driver to accept being a number two; he has the strong character we previously saw in Nico Rosberg.

“There is a possibility that Alpine could make a jump next season”

Outside the top three, Alpine interests me. I’ve heard a lot of people have left Mercedes and gone to Enstone in the past year. There is a possibility that Alpine could make a jump next season. It performed well in 2022, but should have been way better without the reliability issues that affected Fernando Alonso in particular. Performance is one thing, but you need reliability too. The team needs to get on top of that.

What about the driver line-up? Well, I like Esteban Ocon, even though there are mixed feelings about him in the paddock. Some say he’s a bit elbows out, but Max does that and there’s respect for him. There seems to be less for Esteban, because I think he’s difficult in a racing situation – although I don’t remember any crazy moves from him. I also think he compared well to Alonso. You have to earn the right to be a team leader and he has that chance now to show he’s more than capable.

Within Alpine I think there is a desire for a Frenchman to do well and now they have two of them, with Pierre Gasly coming in. He will be fresh coming out of the Red Bull fold and into a bigger team than AlphaTauri. When he was at Red Bull against Max he struggled, as others have. Maybe it was the expectations of the team every time he went out, and they will be high at Alpine too. Let’s see how he handles it this time. I think these two are a good pairing who will push each other on. If Alpine gives them the car, they have to deliver.

McLaren needs to make the next step, which it didn’t manage in 2022. But the team that really has to up its game is Aston Martin. In Alonso, we saw again how tough he can be on a team and he left Alpine on a negative note. He was quite verbal once again – and he’ll be pushing Aston as I write! The team has to produce because if it doesn’t that’s when Fernando puts on the verbal pressure. He’s got Pedro de la Rosa with him, as he had at Ferrari, and he has a calming effect on Fernando. But there is potential for fireworks at Aston. Then again, the team knows what it is getting, for better and for worse.

Johnny Herbert was a Formula 1 driver from 1989-2000 and a Le Mans winner in 1991. He is a regular contributor to Sky Sports F1.
Follow Johnny on Twitter @johnnyherbertf1