What Autosport is looking forward to in 2025

The Dakar Rally has claimed its first high-profile victims, and the chequered flag has fallen on the Dubai 24 Hours with victory claimed by the Al Manar Racing by WRT BMW. After a brief lull while gravy-soaked turkey and pigs-in-blankets were consumed, motorsport is well and truly back.

The year ahead promises numerous talking points across the spectrum of categories. From Formula 1’s most successful driver partnering up with its most storied team, to the return of a giant to the top class of the Le Mans 24 Hours and another shake-up to the World Rally Championship’s points system in the offing, here are our correspondents’ nominations for what to look out for in 2025.

Entries by Haydn Cobb, Stuart Codling, Ewan Gale, Tom Howard, Oleg Karpov, James Newbold and Ben Vinel

Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari

Hamilton takes over from Sainz as Leclerc’s team-mate this year, following the end of his long Mercedes tenure

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

More significant even than the anomalous (in this era) presence of six rookies on the grid, Lewis Hamilton’s high-profile move to Ferrari is F1’s prime new storyline of 2025. Few other sportspeople get to open such significant new chapters in their careers at the age of 40.

You might think that after seven world championships and 105 grand prix wins, Hamilton has nothing left to prove – and that the risks of joining Ferrari outweigh the potential benefits. However, following that premise means misunderstanding what makes Hamilton what he is. Ask him about previous races, even his greatest victories, and he’ll admit to a rather fuzzy recall of them; this is a man always looking forwards, not back.

Hamilton has also spent a great many of his 40 years on this earth proving doubters wrong. Like any great sportsperson, he has immense self-belief but this is underpinned not just by genuine talent but by a forceful work ethic. And he expects those around him to imbue their efforts with the same energy as him.

So, even though Hamilton now lists ‘racing driver’ as the third of his professional occupations on his LinkedIn profile, this isn’t a cynical attempt at squeezing a few more salary-paying years. Neither is his aim of winning more races and titles at Ferrari some quixotic fantasy.

Sure, there are obstacles – he’s struggled with the characteristics of this generation of cars, and Ferrari’s development trajectory remains open to question – but what’s more energising for Hamilton is the opportunity for a fresh start after becoming disillusioned at Mercedes.

Marc Marquez to run riot in red

Marquez switches from satellite Gresini bike to factory Ducati this year, demonstrating the wisdom of ditching Honda

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

Just 12 months ago Marc Marquez was the story going into the 2024 MotoGP season as he jumped off the sinking ship Honda for Gresini Ducati. From the outset, it was considered a gamble, but as the campaign progressed it was a masterstroke for rider and team.

Despite year-old machinery, the eight-time world champion was the only rider to consistently take the fight to title contenders Jorge Martin and Francesco Bagnaia. Notably, a 1,000-day wait for victory marked an emotional end to a redemption arc after years of career-threatening injuries and ill-tempered machinery. But Marquez’s insatiable focus on battling for titles again meant his climb up the MotoGP hierarchy needed to scale a fresh height for 2025.

A contract saga landed Marquez a slot at the factory Ducati squad, muscling out a place that was earmarked for Martin, putting the biggest name in MotoGP onto the dominant package. To underline Marquez’s focus, he has, temporarily at least, put on hold long-time sponsors Red Bull and Oakley due to Ducati partner clashes – focusing on a title challenge ahead of lucrative personal deals – while painting a positive early integration into the team.

How long that may last within the Ducati fold is anyone’s guess. But to give credit to the Italian manufacturer it did handle the tricky situation of Bagnaia vs outgoing and eventual champion Martin superbly in the crunch weeks of 2024. Marquez and an intra-factory Ducati tussle could create bigger headaches, particularly if Martin on the Aprilia can be a disruptive force against the all-dominating Ducati stable of recent seasons.

Even 18 months ago, Marquez racing for the factory Ducati squad was unthinkable. But as reality bites, it could be the match-up MotoGP has been dreaming of and a nightmare realised for the rest of the grid. HC

A first peek at what Antonelli can do in F1

Antonelli has had fleeting outings in FP1 in the public eye, but now will have many more eyeballs on him as he replaces Hamilton at Mercedes

Photo by: Dom Romney / Motorsport Images

No Formula 1 debut has been as exciting to me as Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s since Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen joined the world championship in 2007 – probably because, like them, he will race for a top team in his maiden season (though Kovalainen’s Renault R27 ended up being way off the pace throughout that campaign, but the Enstone-based squad still was the reigning constructors’ champion).

Antonelli was worth keeping an eye on as soon as he joined the Mercedes academy in 2019, which he proved worthy of by winning back-to-back titles in the CIK-FIA European Championship’s OK category in 2020 and 2021. He went on to take four more crowns in his maiden two full campaigns in single-seaters, thrashing the opposition in Formula 4’s most competitive championship in Italy – he scored 12 pole positions and 13 wins.

Last season was admittedly mildly underwhelming, but one must not forget the Italian jumped into F2 at 17 from the Formula Regional European Championship, bypassing a usually unmissable F3 step. In that context, his sixth place overall was honourable – especially when the pecking order was sometimes eyebrow-raising.

Antonelli had ups and downs, but he still took two wins. His highly-rated, more experienced team-mate Oliver Bearman was outqualified (6-5, excluding Monaco due to split qualifying groups) and outscored (113 points to 75, with two fewer races for the Briton).

Not dissimilarly to Hamilton with McLaren a couple of decades ago, Antonelli is graduating to a powerful team he has been affiliated with for six years, and has big shoes to fill… replacing this very same driver, whose partnership with Mercedes is the most successful in the history of F1.

Toto Wolff knows he needs to put as little pressure as possible on his youngster, but the Austrian will seek the right balance in terms of mindset after Antonelli crashed out on his first flying lap in Free Practice 1 at Monza. The Italian attacking flat-out certainly made for entertaining viewing, but it was obviously not what his team needed – particularly so early in the session.

This is what we can expect this year: flashes of speed and the occasional rookie mistake. To me, there is little doubt Antonelli will give George Russell a hard time; what nobody knows is how hard. BV

Newgarden’s bid for a three-peat

Newgarden pounced on O’Ward to win another Indy 500 last year – but can he make history and complete the hattrick?

Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Motorsport Images

Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden may not have had the 2024 he was aiming for at the start of the IndyCar Series season, but he did make history by becoming only the fifth driver to win the Indianapolis 500 in back-to-back years.

The American did so in just as dramatic a fashion as he had when winning in 2023, disposing of Arrow McLaren driver Pato O’Ward around the outside at Turn 3 on the final lap, just a few hundred metres down the road from where he passed Marcus Ericsson 12 months previously.

With the dramatic end came the first driver to defend the Indy 500 since Helio Castroneves managed the feat in 2002 and now provides Newgarden the chance to become the first to manage three on the bounce.

It is hard to see why he wouldn’t be in the mix given his form at the superspeedway in the past two years – Penske able to finely tune his machinery across the ‘Month of May’ to ensure it was in tip-top condition for the main event. Although the debut of hybrid engines at the Brickyard will present a new challenge, Penske drivers won five of the seven races staged on ovals following its mid-season adoption at Mid-Ohio last year, so the chance for the hat-trick really is on.

Of course, Newgarden will have 32 other drivers thirsty to drink the milk come the end of the 200 laps, and there is surely no way he can up the ante in the drama stakes compared to the last two years. But if he can add his face to the Borg-Warner trophy for the third time, then imagine the buzz it will create. The 109th Indy 500 can’t come soon enough! EG

Verstappen coping with third-fastest car all year

If Red Bull doesn’t bring the best car to the track in 2025, there could be a repeat of Hungary radio fury from Verstappen

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar

By the end of last season, Red Bull had largely sorted out its car, which Max Verstappen described as a “monster” in Monza. The Dutchman still managed to win in Brazil and, more importantly, in Qatar on a dry track. And while the second half of the season has been challenging for both the team and the champion, the title was never really in doubt thanks to the gap Verstappen managed to build at the start of the year.

It was still amazing to see how he managed to keep Lando Norris at bay as McLaren got quicker and quicker, scoring points meticulously and squeezing out most of his opportunities – at least more often than not. But that same gap allowed him to dictate his own terms to Norris, and the Briton was never in a position to push his rival as hard as he might have liked.

This year could be different, though, and it’s not too unreasonable to imagine that Verstappen could end up with the third-fastest car on most tracks, albeit by a very small margin. And if that’s the case, he’ll undoubtedly provide plenty of entertainment.

The most intriguing question is what form it will take: can he continue to get the best possible result week in and week out, capitalising on his rivals’ mistakes, or will he eventually let his frustration creep in? Verstappen is fantastic in a dominant car, as 2023 proved, but he doesn’t really hold back when he’s angry. Hungary last year was the latest evidence that he’s not always calm and collected when things don’t go his way.

Will he stay with Red Bull if he’s not given the material to challenge for another title, or will he look elsewhere for the future? Whatever it is, if Red Bull can’t consistently challenge McLaren and Ferrari, Verstappen won’t be happy with simply finishing fifth – but exactly how he reacts will be fascinating to watch. OK

Aston Martin’s Le Mans return

Aston Martin will enter the Valkyrie AMR-LMH in its bid for a first outright Le Mans win since 1959

Photo by: Aston Martin

Ferrari has been the biggest name in motorsport for decades, though hardcore sportscar fans might plump for Porsche. But, for some Brits, Aston Martin could be thrown into the mix, especially when it comes to Le Mans. It certainly is for this writer.

Being brought up on a combination of Formula 1 on TV and attending Aston Martin Owners Club events, I learned about Aston’s mixed motorsport history from a young age. A piece of schoolwork done at the age of eight focused on the exploits of Aston and Stirling Moss on the way to the 1959 sportscar world title. I appreciate now that was probably a pretty odd thing for my teacher to mark, but at least I can be sure no one else handed in something similar!

The point is that, despite Aston Martin’s recent F1 efforts, endurance racing and Le Mans is its true home, which is why the green team’s commitment to the World Endurance Championship’s Hypercar class is the big thing I’m looking forward to in 2025 (aside from Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari, which surely interests everyone!).

Aston’s solo overall Le Mans success came in 1959, since its sporadic appearances have largely been stories of unfilled potential, disasters, or success in the GT classes. The thought that the Heart of Racing/factory effort should be better placed than most Aston attempts since the 1950s is tantalising.

And so is the fact that Aston is going down the LMH route, like Ferrari and Toyota, rather than the cheaper LMDh path favoured by most, including Porsche. The Valkyrie AMR-LMH’s 6.5-litre V12 is likely to surpass Cadillac’s 5.5-litre V8 as the best-sounding WEC car and Aston’s return to Le Mans makes it hard to think which manufacturers are left on the sportscar lovers’ wish list… KT

Rovanpera’s full-time return and a simpler WRC points system

Rovanpera took four wins in a part-time campaign last season and now returns with batteries recharged to a new-look WRC without hybrid and featuring new tyres

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

Last year’s World Rally Championship title fight was a thoroughly entertaining affair and will be remembered for its dramatic season finale, but this year’s could be even spicier. That’s down to a number of variables but chief among them are the full-time return of two-time world champion, Kalle Rovanpera, a new points system and changes to technical and sporting regulations.

During a partial campaign last year, Rovanpera continued to show his class by racking up four wins. That was two more than the eventual world champion, Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville, although the Toyota man did make the most of a road positional advantage.

There is no hiding away from Rovanpera’s supreme talent behind the wheel and now rejuvenated after what he described as a fun 2024 mini-sabbatical, the Finn is hungry for a third world title – a worrying thought for his rivals. Rovanpera’s return poses an interesting narrative for a potential four-way title fight that will no doubt be fiercely defended by Neuville, now without the pressure of being the WRC’s nearly man.

Neuville’s Hyundai team-mate Ott Tanak will also be desperate to right the wrongs of 2024 while Toyota’s Elfyn Evans will be aiming to go one step better after ending 2024 as the title runner-up for a fourth time.

Adding extra intrigue to the battle is the fact all the drivers are effectively starting from scratch, with hybrid power now removed from Rally1 cars which will now run on a new control tyre supplied by Hankook. It’s virtually impossible to predict which driver and car combination will perfect the adjustment the quickest.

This title fight will also be played out across a new points system that appears on paper to be less complex than last year’s radical concept, while retaining the elements that made WRC Sundays must-see motorsport action. TH

Prototype racing back at Silverstone

ELMS will be back in action at Silverstone for the first time since the pandemic

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

It may ‘only’ be the European Le Mans Series, but the return of international sportscar racing to Silverstone on 14 September is something to celebrate. As Gary Watkins explored in his column when the news was announced in October, it can only be hoped that the first ACO-sanctioned race held at Britain’s most storied circuit since 2019 does serve as a precursor to a World Endurance Championship comeback.

But in the meantime, for sportscar racing fans from these shores, the four-hour race for LMP2, LMP3 and LMGT3 machinery will hold plenty of interest. The full entry list has yet to be revealed, but a 44-car grid can be expected and supporters of British drivers will be spoiled for choice with the likes of Oliver Jarvis, Ben Hanley, Nick Yelloly and Jamie Chadwick leading the line.

The new generation of LMP3 machines, powered by Toyota twin-turbo V6 engines prepared by ORECA, will make a UK bow while the variety on display in the GT ranks – which includes six manufacturers – will make a three-day general admission of £40 (with under-16s going free) well worthwhile. JN