Karun Chandhok: Two reasons why McLaren can beat Red Bull to the constructors’ title

The dominant victory that Lando Norris secured in Zandvoort has meant that we have some great stories to follow as we head into the second half of the F1 season. The main narrative I’m looking forward to following is whether Red Bull and Max can fight back after a recent run of form which has seen it slip behind McLaren but also occasionally Mercedes. We would never have put money on this at the start of the season and the impressive run that McLaren has had cannot be underestimated.

With Rob Marshall joining them from Red Bull at the start of the season, there would have been a wealth of knowledge carried over from Milton Keynes to bolster the impressive work being done by Peter Prodromou and the design team. The new wind tunnel will also pay dividends now and with a top line-up in the cockpit, the team should have a great shot at the constructors’ title.

I think that the drivers’ championship will be harder to secure as Verstappen has been consistently the standout driver of ’24. Apart from Budapest, he’s managed to maximise the performance of the car on every occasion this season, something which no other driver on the grid has done as dependably. He can’t do it by finishing off the podium too often and will be keen for Red Bull to find some more performance in the car.

Ferrari and Aston are two teams who really need to make some strides forward in the rest of the season. The brilliant Aston performances from early in 2023 seem an eternity ago – the team that was beating Mercedes last year has less than a third of the points of its engine partners at the moment. Whatever is going on in terms of its design and development results will certainly be below the expectations of team owner Lawrence Stroll and the pressure will be ramping up. Adrian Newey rumours continue to circulate and if Aston wants to have the benefit of his knowledge, it need to get things locked in soon and push for an early release from Red Bull.

“Jack Doohan has been given a promotion to the race seat by Alpine”

The Ferrari season started well and has fallen away in terms of outright speed. The drivers are doing an excellent job – Charles Leclerc’s most recent drive in Holland was a case in point – and this has kept the team in touch with McLaren but certainly the wins in Melbourne and Monaco feel like a long while ago. Both of those are unconventional circuits and you’d have to say that on pure pace now, both Mercedes and McLaren seem to be ahead. With the high-stakes arrival of Lewis Hamilton to Maranello for next season, Ferrari needs to use the rest of this year to get a clear path forward in terms of development of the 2025 car.

Alpine is coming off a turbulent few years with multiple changes of team bosses, drivers, technical leadership and engineering staff. New team principal Oli Oakes is someone I’ve known for years and is a pragmatic and smart guy. He was an excellent driver in his karting days and understands the sport’s politics. The step up from running a junior formula team that essentially buys everything from outside suppliers to an F1 team that manufactures all the bits is a huge change. It will be interesting to see if he can calm the waters there.

After a winter where we had an unprecedented situation with all the teams retaining exactly the same line-ups as the year before, we know that 60% of the grid will have a new line-up for 2025 and that could go up to 80% if the two Red Bull-owned teams have a shuffle.

Carlos Sainz has signed for Williams following the rejection from Mercedes and Red Bull. This is a massive coup for Williams and will create one of the best driver line-ups on the 2025 grid. Jack Doohan has been given a promotion to the race seat by Alpine which is nice to see as I felt he was fast but unlucky in F2 so the results on paper never really reflected his pace. With Valtteri Bottas likely to stay at Sauber–Audi, all eyes are on the Red Bull seats.

We know Verstappen and Yuki Tsunoda are locked in and while Sergio Pérez has been announced for 2025, it seems like there are various performance clauses. This leaves Daniel Ricciardo and Liam Lawson battling Pérez for the two seats. Helmut Marko has made a few public declarations that Lawson will have a seat for next year, which Christian Horner denied. Ricciardo is still hoping for a promotion to the big team. It still seems there’s a wider battle between Horner and Marko, where the former favours Pérez and Ricciardo, while the latter favours Lawson. The next few months will be fascinating to see as a top seat at Red Bull remains in play.

A former racing driver in Formula 1, WEC and Formula E, Karun Chandhok is an analyst for Sky Sports F1
Follow Karun on Twitter @karunchandhok