For Valtteri Bottas, the season-opener in Bahrain was an unfortunate sign of things to come. The Finn qualified 16th — seven-tenths off the pace of Max Verstappen‘s pole-sitting Red Bull — and finished a distant 19th.
The struggles continued from there, as Bottas finished no higher than 13th over the next 21 consecutive races and suffered 14 Q1 exits. A late upgrade package, deployed at the Qatar GP, gave him a brief chance to score points, but Lando Norris‘ McLaren pushed him down to eleventh in the final moments. A DNF at the season finale in Abu Dhabi rather summed up the Finn’s season.
Zhou Guanyu had a similarly tumultuous campaign. He began well in Bahrain, finishing eleventh, but failed to crack the top 13 over the next 21 race weekends. Fortunately for Sauber, Zhou’s persistent hunt for improvement eventually paid off as he finished a brilliant eighth in Qatar after starting 12th on the grid. But a 13th place finish in Abu Dhabi saw the season finish on a mediocre note.
2025: Building toward the future
Sauber has invested in the future
Sauber
Following a torrid campaign in 2024, Sauber will be hoping for improvement during its final F1 campaign in 2025. But, as of now, the team’s chances of moving up the running order seem bleak.
Focus will likely remain on finalising Audi’s takeover, which is set to be complete by the end of the season. Former Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto and former Red Bull sporting director Johnathan Wheatley have been brought in to lead the team, but doubt remains over the team’s competitiveness.
Nevertheless, despite all the behind the scenes shuffling, new Sauber driver pairing Nico Hülkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto will likely be aiming to impress in an attempt to secure their long-term futures with the German car giant.
Sauber F1 2025 driver line-up
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| Nico Hülkenberg | Gabriel Bortoleto |
- Hülkenberg joins from Haas, hoping to lead Audi in 2026
- 2024 F2 champion Gabriel Bortoleto joins the team on multi-year deal
Key personnel
Sauber CEO: Mattia Binotto
The new face of Sauber: Binotto
Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty
Mattia Binotto was announced as the new Chief Operating and Chief Technical Officer of Sauber in August 2024 — replacing Andreas Seidl, who had led the project since 2022.
Binotto, who was formerly team principal at Ferrari, has insisted that a “lot has to be done” in order to ready the team for both the Audi takeover in 2026 and the new technical regulations, which are set to shake up the running order.
“It’s a long journey, we know about that, and acting on behaviours, maybe it’s even the most difficult, but we have started our journey,” said Binotto. “I think we’ve got a few projects… I have to say that since I started already a lot has happened since then, which is not only the improvement at the racetrack, signing Bortoleto, having a new line-up for next year.
“It’s about Qatar as well, investment and partnership – which for us, it’s a lot of capital injection – but showing that overall as a team we are moving in that direction with the right approach, the right thinking, thinking big, which is exactly the mindset we’re discussing about.”