Carlos Sainz confirmed he will join Williams in 2025 at the start of the summer break, leaving four F1 seats up for grabs in the driver market; Mercedes are the biggest team to not confirm line-up; F1 returns on August 23-25 with the Dutch Grand Prix, live on Sky Sports F1
Monday 12 August 2024 12:43, UK
Formula 1 may not have had a race for two weeks but negotiations have been taking place at some teams to finalise their 2025 driver line-up.
Mercedes are yet to announce who will replace Lewis Hamilton as the seven-time world champion will leave the team for Ferrari at the end of this year.
There are unknowns at Red Bull and RB due to Sergio Perez's poor form before the summer break, although the Mexican will remain as Max Verstappen's team-mate for the rest of 2024.
Alpine have not decided who will partner Pierre Gasly next year and Sauber also haven't confirmed Nico Hulkenberg's team-mate for next season, ahead of Audi's official arrival in 2026.
Sky Sports F1 takes a look at which drivers are likely to fill the remaining seats.
Toto Wolff made a public appeal for Verstappen earlier this year but Mercedes' hopes of signing the reigning world champion for 2025 are very low.
The favourite to replace Hamilton is Formula 2 driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who has been part of the Mercedes junior programme since 2019.
Antonelli is highly rated after winning multiple junior single-seater titles at the first time of asking since stepping up from karts to racing cars in 2021.
The 17-year-old Italian is currently competing in his debut F2 season, after skipping F3, and is seventh in the standings.
"Every single category he participated in was a success. He won everything as a rookie and his karting record is immaculate," Wolff told Sky Sports F1 in June.
"The F2 team [Prema] is struggling a lot this year. Interestingly, Oliver Bearman is his team-mate and they are both not featuring [at the front], so that certainly plays a role.
"We are testing a lot in F1 and he's doing a splendid job. Kimi definitely plays a major role in our line-up.
"F2 has no meaning to us, that context. But I also want to see how it pans out."
Antonelli has been testing the 2021 and 2022 Mercedes F1 cars throughout this year, with more events planned for later in 2024.
In May, Hamilton revealed he would choose Antonelli as his replacement if it was up to him.
At the start of the summer break, Christian Horner confirmed Perez will continue as Verstappen's team-mate at Red Bull for the rest of 2024.
Perez came under huge pressure after scoring just 24 points across seven events and was eliminated four times in Q1.
The Mexican had signed a two-year deal in May to stay at Red Bull until the end of 2026 but Red Bull have the option to promote RB drivers Daniel Ricciardo or Yuki Tsunoda into the main team, should they wish.
Ricciardo has made it clear that he wants to return to Red Bull and appears to be liked more compared to Tsunoda, even though the Japanese driver has better results this year.
Tsunoda was announced to stay at RB for 2025 but Ricciardo's future is unclear. There's also the Liam Lawson factor, with Red Bull keen to promote him into one of their cars or risk losing him from the team.
Lawson has been on the sidelines this year, despite impressing in the five race weekends he substituted for Ricciardo at Red Bull's sister team RB, then known as AlphaTauri, last year.
Five into four doesn't go and a lot rests on whether Perez can find some form in the final 10 races.
Alpine are in the middle of changing management as Bruno Famin leaves as team principal and Oliver Oakes will now take charge.
Pierre Gasly signed a multi-year deal in June and Alpine reserve driver Jack Doohan is in pole position to replace the departing Esteban Ocon.
Doohan finished third in last year's F2 Championship and has been in a similar role to Lawson, as Alpine's test and reserve driver.
That leaves Sauber, which will become Audi in 2026 when the new F1 regulations begin. There has been little noise coming out of the Sauber and Audi camp after their initial plan to sign Carlos Sainz didn't come to fruition.
Hulkenberg has already been announced as a Sauber driver for next year, so at least one of Valtteri Bottas or Zhou Guanyu will lose their seat. With the way the driver market has gone, there's a good chance one of them will stay for 2025, unless Sauber opt for an F2 driver.
Formula 1 returns after the summer break with the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort on August 23-25, live on Sky Sports F1. Stream every F1 race and more with a NOW Sports Month Membership - No contract, cancel anytime.
