The 10 Most Significant F1 2020 Moments
The Formula One season came to a close at Abu Dhabi on Sunday. It was an anticlimactic race for an otherwise exciting season. It was the shortest F1 season since 1966, with only 163 days separating green lights in Austria and the chequered flag at Yas Marina.
However, when Jack Brabham won the final of his three world championships he did so in only nine races. Meanwhile, this year’s calendar managed to squeeze in 17 Grands Prix, going to exotic places such as Spain, Portugal, Britain, err… Britain and Bahrain… twice…
When the teams showed up to Catalunya for pre-season testing in February, not many would have bet on the season we ended up with, but it managed to entertain more often than not.
There were many highs and lows, with many of the drivers getting their moment in the sun. But with winners, there must be losers and there were certainly plenty of those around the paddock this year too.
Not every event could deliver the raging action of a thrilling F1 race, but even the poor ones were to be savoured in a year that, at one point, looked like we might not see any races at all.
The drama got underway in pre-season testing when everyone got their first glimpse of Racing Point’s “pink Mercedes.” It was quickly apparent that they had seemingly simply copied the design of the previous year’s championship winning Silver Arrow, the W10.
This inevitably led to protests from the other midfield teams that aren’t supplied engines by the German car manufacturer, but it was ultimately a case that was solved relatively pain-free with all the teams accepting a fine and 15 point penalty for Racing Point, as well as adjustments to the regulations clarifying that copying such as this is now illegal moving forward.
The other noteworthy moment of pre-season testing was Mercedes themselves showing off their latest innovation. The Dual Axis Steering (DAS) system that allowed their car to more efficiently get heat into their tyres.
This system was also protested by their rivals, but it led to nothing and the DAS system was here to stay, but it will be gone in 2021 due to a slight regulation change closing the loophole that Mercedes exploited in the first place.
By the time the season eventually got under way, Lewis Hamilton pushed all his effort into supporting the Black Lives Matter movement within Formula One, a courageous and honourable act that was unfortunately not handled by the rule-makers and broadcasters all too well.
On top of that, some of the other drivers made questionable remarks and showed a lack of support for Hamilton on a very important issue that he was clearly leading the charge behind in the sport.
The Mercedes dominance continued on track this season, but it was at the second race in Britain where it looked like Red Bull might be able to put up a fight this year. Max Verstappen climbed from fourth on the grid to win thanks to better tyre management and strategy. It was, however, the first of only two wins this season and marked a false dawn for the team’s title challenge.
Sister team, Alpha Tauri, were at the centre of one of the season’s best feel-good moments. Pierre Gasly endured a difficult 2019, but put those struggles behind him for definite in a bizarre Italian Grand Prix that saw the Frenchman hold off the late charge of Carlos Sainz to win his first ever F1 race, and the team’s first victory since Sebastian Vettel won at that very same track in 2008.
Gasly’s victory was just one of many feel-good moments for the midfield drivers this season, as 13 people all ended up on the podium at some point of the year. This included first time podium sitters Lando Norris, Esteban Ocon and Alexander Albon.
But as interesting and exciting as these moments are, they are but honourable mentions in a list of the 10 most significant moments of the 2020 F1 season:
10. McLaren Secure Third
The hybrid era has been a turbulent one for McLaren. Despite having the pairing of Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso in 2015 they came ninth in the constructor standings. They improved to sixth with this pairing in 2016, but fell back down to ninth in 2017 with Stoffel Vandoorne having replaced Button.
The Honda experiment had gone disastrously, and after the 2018 season finally made the switch to Renault engines. But the fall from grace of McLaren throughout the decade had been stark, and it seemed a long time before they would be anywhere near the top again.
Their fourth place in the constructors in 2019 was certainly promising, but the gap to the top three teams was still massive.
But on Sunday, McLaren secured the victory in the intense midfield battle for that third place in the constructors championship. The celebrations after the race finished made it clear just how much it meant to the team.
They have come a long way since the lows of 2015–2017 and third place was a deserved reward for their hard work in climbing back up the rankings. However, they were helped by the massive downfall of Ferrari in catching up to the top three.
Next season, with the Mercedes engine now in place, will be a real test of their upward momentum. Presumably, Ferrari will be back up to pace, so the competition for that third place will be much stiffer. But for now, they can enjoy the plaudits on a well earned podium place in the standings.
9. Williams is Sold
Sir Frank Williams started the eponymous F1 team back in the 1970’s. Since then, they have gone on to become one of the great sporting success stories. They have won nine constructors and seven drivers championships. But in the last decade or so they have mostly struggled to keep up with the leading pack.
Their last victory came with Pastor Maldonado in 2012 and their last podium came in 2017 with Lance Stroll and their last point scored came in the chaotic 2019 German GP with Robert Kubica.
Their continued decline has been one of the saddest F1 stories of the decade, and it was in 2020 that the continuation of the Williams family in the sport finally came to an end. Frank’s daughter, Claire Williams, left the team following the sale and they are now owned by a US investment group known as Dorilton Capital in a deal worth €152 million.
What happens next for the Williams team remains unclear but for now at least they will retain the Williams name. Hopefully this decade will signal greater success for the team.
8. Sakhir GP
The Bahrain GP the week before was relatively mundane, as F1 races go, but for the lap one incident involving Romain Grosjean. But the layout for the Sakhir GP would use the outer ring of the same track. Lap times were expected to be much quicker than usual, and an extra 30 laps were added to the 57 we usually see at Bahrain.
Following the Bahrain GP, it was then announced that Hamilton had tested positive for coronavirus and thus would miss the Sakhir GP. Previously in the season, when both Racing Point drivers missed races for the same reason, it was Nico Hulkenberg who stepped in as a last minute replacement.
But Mercedes had options of their own. They negotiated with Williams the release of George Russell to stand-in for the world champion and suddenly the Briton went from being in the slowest car to the quickest. Russell had yet to score a point in his 36 previous F1 races, despite out-qualifying his teammate every time.
This was his chance to prove he deserved to be in a Mercedes car next season, a chance to prove that he could back up the hype around him. Being in the Williams all this time had meant that he was unable to show off his true racing ability, the car was simply too slow to compete.
Russell performed excellently throughout the weekend. He barely fit in the car, having to go down a shoe size to even get inside the cockpit and yet he was still just .026s off Valterri Bottas in qualifying and thoroughly outclassed him during the race itself.
If not for a series of unfortunate events, this would have likely been the first victory of his career and his first ever set of points to boot. However, when his replacement at Williams Jack Aitken spun out at the final corner, it caused a safety car that set in motion a Mercedes disasterclass.
Russell and Bottas would suffer pitstop trouble. Russell had to come in two laps in a row due to a mix-up in whose set of tyres went on each car. This left him with a set of Bottas’ tyres on his car, which is against the rules. While Bottas himself came into the pits only to leave with the same set of tyres he arrived in with.
This mix up left them in fourth and fifth place and Sergio Perez inherited the race lead. The Mexican had been taken out on lap one in an incident with Charles Leclerc which left him in last place, but he charged up the field to sit nicely in the final podium place before the safety car came out.
Russell, clearly frustrated, got on with the task at hand and climbed his way back up to second while Bottas slipped down to eighth. Ultimately, a left rear puncture meant he had to pit one last time, which left Perez an unassailable lead on Ocon in second place.
Russell couldn’t complete the dream of winning his first race for Mercedes, but in his place was a victor just as popular on the paddock. This was Perez’s 190th F1 race and his first ever win and the first ever win for the Racing Point team.
At the time of writing, Perez currently has no drive for next season, but this victory was the reward to a spectacular season, the best of his career, and it solidified him in fourth place in the driver standings. If this is to be the end of Perez in F1, then he has left on the highest of high notes.
7. Ferrari’s Disaster Year
Ferrari showed up to pre-season testing and something was clearly afoot. They were nowhere to be seen at the top of the time-sheets. On top of this all, there was a very secretive agreement reached with the FIA over their engine. But it wasn’t until the team from Maranello showed up at Austria that it was clear just how bad things were for Ferrari.
Despite title challenges in 2017 & 2018, their 2019 season was a step backwards in the standings. This was made up for with victories in Belgium and their home race in Italy. Leclerc had also impressed in his first year for the team, competing with his teammate and four time world champion Vettel. He even earned the most pole positions of any driver, with seven.
But in 2020 the car struggled massively to compete with the likes of Racing Point, McLaren and Renault. A sixth place finish in the standings is simply not good enough for the Scuderia and there is now an immense amount of pressure to deliver next year.
Team principal Mattia Binotto skipped some of the final races in 2020 to stay back in Italy to work on the car for next year. While they have downplayed their ability to immediately bounce back to competing for race wins, they will need to close the gap to Red Bull if they are to get back to winning ways anytime soon.
6. Hamilton Wins the Championship in Turkey
The addition of the Turkish GP came quite late, relative to the other circuits added to the 2020 calendar. It closed out the European swing of the season, which made up the first 14 races of the year. It was the first race where it was mathematically possible for Hamilton to win his seventh world championship. All he had to do was finish within seven points of his teammate to secure a fourth world title in a row.
The weekend, however, was total chaos as wet weather and a re-surfaced track meant there was a total lack of grip from the tyres and everyone was struggling. Free practice saw lap times well down on where expectations were before the weekend began.
Wet weather qualifying threw another spanner in the works. Not only did it wash away any of the rubber that was laid down during practice, but it became even slippier as teams struggled to get heat into the tyres.
Verstappen looked set to secure his first pole position of the year, and the first non-Mercedes pole of 2020. But a sudden charge in pace from the Racing Point meant he was consigned to second place on the grid again. A shock first time pole sitter was achieved by Racing Point’s Stroll.
The race was also endured under wet conditions but as the track dried up it was Hamilton who found the most grip. The car had struggled in the wet conditions, but Hamilton found a way to make it work while Bottas was stuck spinning at the back of the grid.
Stroll had led the majority of the race but his decision to pit for a second set of intermediate tyres saw him fall down as far as ninth. It was only Hamilton and Perez who managed to keep that first set of intermediate tyres going until the end of the race. Every other car had stopped for a new set but for those two, who held on as they wore away into basically slick tyres.
It was one of the most dominant wins of Hamilton’s career, in the most difficult of circumstances, and it was the perfect way for him to secure a seventh world title. It was a record breaking season for the British driver, but this was the cherry on top of his almost perfect campaign.
5. Season Begins in Austria
There were times this year when it looked like there wouldn’t be a 2020 F1 season. The pandemic had grinded the sport down to a halt. A factory freeze was put on car development while the FIA figured out their next move.
Many of the venues that had scheduled Grands Prix for the year were no longer an option and it was unclear when the sport could even re-start.
Initially races were added in a piecemeal fashion. The season would begin at Austria, in its originally scheduled slot, but it would then return to the same track the following weekend.
Austria was one of three such double header weekends that eventually made it onto the final calendar. The sport would also double dip at Silverstone and in Bahrain. For the latter two, there would at least be changes made to ensure some differences and it worked for the most part.
That moment when the cars first came out on track for Friday practice was a landmark moment for the sport. Amid all the panic of the pandemic, the sporting bodies and the teams had all come together to find a safe way to carry out a 2020 season.
The second race in Austria, named the Stryian GP, was an underwhelming follow up to the first Austrian GP but the second races in Britain and Bahrain were arguably more entertaining than the first.
F1 would also return to historic tracks such as the Nurburgring, Imola and Istanbul Park, which haven’t hosted an official event since 2013, 2006 and 2011. We were also introduced to the likes of Mugello and Portimao, which were very welcome additions.
Each of these tracks, new and old, added something fresh to the calendar which has become very stagnant in recent years. With the 2021 schedule set to return to its old format, there has been a lot of clamour for one of these five tracks to take the currently unannounced fourth race in next year’s 23 race calendar. Portimao in particular was a fan and driver favourite alike.
4. Silly Season Kicks Off Early
Silly Season™ is one of F1’s more eccentric qualities. You can wake up one day and suddenly the whole sport has been turned upside down. In 2014, it was announced one morning that Fernando Alonso was leaving Ferrari for McLaren and in his place was Red Bull’s Vettel. The four time champion was leaving the team he’d called home for six seasons. It was the sign of a new era of the sport.
But six seasons later and it was Vettel’s turn to be replaced at Ferrari. On May 12, with not a single race to 2020’s name, Ferrari announced the departure of the German driver at the end of the season.
This began the domino effect of Carlos Sainz leaving McLaren to take over as teammate to Leclerc. Daniel Ricciardo was announced as leaving Renault for the British team, to compete alongside Norris in 2021. And finally in the sequence, Renault were bringing back Alonso after his two years away from the sport.
Just like that, the grid was given the kind of shake up for 2021 that we only see once every five or six years. While the cars will mostly be the same in 2021 as in 2020, at least now this shake up means there are now going to be tons of new narratives and story-lines to look forward to next year.
How Sainz handles the pressure at Ferrari, Vettel finding his feet again in the midfield, Alonso’s return and the banter boys at McLaren. There’s now plenty to look forward to in 2021.
3. Grosjean’s Crash
The Bahrain GP was marred by the worst incident seen at an F1 race since the fateful 2014 Japan GP. That day saw the crash that ultimately led to the tragic passing of Jules Bianchi. The Frenchman’s death was the first seen in F1 since Aryton Senna perished at the 1994 San Marino GP.
The reaction to Senna’s death led to overwhelming change in the design of F1 cars. Thanks to the work of Professor Sid Watkins, F1 has never been safer than in the last 25 years.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to ensure 100% safety and Bianchi’s death was the worst possible reminder of the dangers posed by F1 drivers every time they step into a car.
Following Bianchi’s incident, the halo was designed and implemented onto F1 cars in time for the 2018 season. At the time, the halo was met with derision and was dismissed by many as a useless attempt at adding safety to the car.
But it was the halo that saved Romain Grosjean’s life in Bahrain. His Haas car pierced through the barrier at Turn Three and if not for the halo then he likely would have hit that barrier head first.
The halo was just one of likely six or seven different safety features that saved Grosjean’s life. It was a miracle and it was a great example of just how far F1 has come in ensuring the safety of its drivers. Hopefully, this will now also start another series of further investment into safety in the sport and this time the driver involved will live to see the fruit of that investment.
2. 2021 Regulations Pushed Back a Year
The 2020 season was originally meant to be the final of the current regulations. After years of intense discussions, the 2021 season was supposed to mark the beginning of the next era of F1. But those new regulations were pushed back a year and now won’t be seen until 2022.
This was in large part due to the financial constraints that teams now found themselves under due to the pandemic. McLaren, for example, were forced to sell their factory to fund money for the team.
The new regulations will bring in spending caps to further help teams afford to stay in the sport. The current spending by the biggest teams was simply unsustainable if the sport was to remain competitive. These new regulations are planned to make racing much easier for the cars, and the spending limits should curb the likes of Ferrari, Mercedes and Red Bull of out-spending the other teams for a massive speed advantage.
It remains to be seen just how successful these regulations will be, but Ross Brawn remains confident that this is the correct way forward for F1 and his optimism is a great source of excitement.
This does mean the 2021 cars will largely be the same as in 2020, which may see another routine championship victory for Mercedes, but if it means teams can now afford to stay in the sport then the long-term benefit will far out-weigh the loss of another mundane championship fight.
1. Australian GP Gets Cancelled
All 10 teams showed up to Australia in March fully expecting the Grand Prix to go ahead as planned. While the coronavirus had taken China by storm, it seemed contained away from the rest of the world.
But that was far from the case, and as the week went on it was becoming increasingly clear that the race was under threat. The idea of packing thousands and thousands of people together for a sporting event no longer seemed morally correct and very suddenly F1 was faced with the “new normal” we were all hearing about.
This was a massive moment not just for F1 but for sport in general. This was one of the first major events to be cancelled anywhere in the world.
Four months would pass before the 2020 season finally began and it was a year like no other. It had so many twists and turns and will live long in the memory as the most unique season in F1’s storied history.
We might not fully see just how much an impact this season has had on the sport for another three to four years. All of these previous moments would not have been possible but for the cancellation of the opening race.
The plug was pulled at the very last moment and it just goes to show how close everything was to actually happening. If the timing was just slightly different then who knows what would have happened next, and many lives were likely saved because of it.
Instead, the drivers and teams went home.
In its place, some of the younger drivers took up streaming themselves on Twitch either together or by themselves. They mostly played racing games for large audiences and even competed against each other in the official F1 video game. There were many great moments from this that we would’ve never seen but for the season being put on hold. A bright spark amid a dark period.
For 2021, let’s hope the sport can arrive for its first Grand Prix and everything comes together as planned. No one truly knows what lies next for the sport in regards to the pandemic, but with vaccines now being circulated around the world this will hopefully mean the beginning of the end of this “new normal” and we can get back to racing without the threat of cancellation hanging over every Grand Prix weekend.
