Belgian Grand Prix 2025 Previews and Predictions (Undercutters Ep29 transcript)
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Undercutters podcast, previewing the Belgian Grand Prix, and also having a quick look back at a couple of other things including Piastri’s penalty and Horner being tossed overboard.
Last season’s race here was fantastic, and we might see strategic cunning on display once again. Will Hulkenberg maintain his fantastic form? Will Norris continue reeling in Piastri? And will we find out if Verstappen really is going to Mercedes.
Quick Look at Spa 00m36s
The Belgian Grand Prix is hosted at Spa, and is the longest track on the calendar at 7km, meaning there are just 44 laps. It’s a fantastic circuit, sadly to be reduced to rotating status on the calendar in the near future, with the epic Eau Rouge early on and a long straight between turns 4 and 5 that can make it tricky to retain the lead on an opening lap. This is also where one of the DRS zones is located, with the other running from turn 19 to turn 1, but that’s pretty short.
Downforce setups can be higher or lower but the 2024 Pirelli stats have it as a 2 out of 5 circuit for downforce. In the middle sector downforce is great but less is better for sectors 1 and 3. High tyre stress and lateral load help explain why two stops was the typical strategy in 2024, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see someone try and make a one stop work.
The run to the first corner isn’t a huge distance, just 165m, but it’s the straight before turn 5 that can be challenging for the lead as there’s a lot of time for a slipstream pass from the man behind. After that the circuit becomes twistier and overtaking more difficult.
Weather can play a role here, and, at the time of writing, rain is possible for Sunday.
The Last Belgian Grand Prix 2m06s
At the 2024 Belgian Grand Prix Verstappen started 11th, despite being fastest in qualifying, due to a 10 place penalty for power unit parts. Instead we had a front row of Leclerc and Perez, followed by Hamilton and Norris, with Piastri and Russell on row three.
Almost everyone, including all the frontrunners, started on the medium tyre. Off the line, Leclerc held his lead and Hamilton got past Perez. Further back, Norris found out gravel isn’t great for grip and slipped back. Verstappen, by contrast, made up ground.
Lap three saw Hamilton get past Leclerc to claim the lead, while Norris was down in 7th with Verstappen, the defending champion, right behind him. On lap 10 Russell and Verstappen pitted for hard tyres, triggering stops from Hamilton, Perez, and Piastri.
The Aussie was looking quick, passing Russell and then Perez. The Mexican also found himself passed by Russell, his promising qualifying giving way to a weak race.
Hamilton led Leclerc by under 2s, with Piastri only a few seconds further off. Things were shaping up nicely.
A slow stop by Ferrari ruined an attempt by Leclerc to undercut Hamilton, who boxed the next lap. Piastri was left flying at the front but his gains were reduced by a slow stop caused by him overshooting his pit box. This put Russell in the lead, and he defied expectations by not pitting again. Obviously he was slower than those on fresh tyres, but could he retain his lead to the end?
Hamilton was 6s behind him, followed by Leclerc and then Piastri. By the time Hamilton halved the gap there were just seven laps left. Behind the Mercedes pair was Piastri, who had overtaken Leclerc and pulled away from the Ferrari, who was defending against Verstappen.
With a couple of laps left Russell and Hamilton were running nose-to-tail and Piastri was closing in rapidly. Remarkably, Russell held out and crossed the line half a second ahead of Hamilton and 1.1s ahead of Piastri for a phenomenally close result. Unfortunately, Russell was subsequently disqualified for his car being underweight, gifting the win to Hamilton, 2nd place to Piastri, and 3rd to Leclerc.
Verstappen, having started 11th, finished 4th and extended his title lead over Norris, who was 5th. Sainz was in 6th, ahead of Perez, Alonso, Ocon, and Ricciardo. This would be the last point Ricciardo would score in Formula 1.
The Piastri Penalty 4m49s
I do want to talk a bit more about the Piastri penalty for his second safety car restart. I maintain that the 10s penalty was clearly unfair, but I can see a case for the 5s penalty. Because the recording of the podcast is usually as soon as possible after the race I didn’t have as much evidence as I would’ve liked, and a few things I’ve seen since have altered my view slightly.
First up, some comparisons. Russell braked hard in Canada, the previous race, and Verstappen passed him, briefly, as he did to Piastri. As others have pointed out, Russell applied half the brake pressure of Piastri. There was no penalty or even investigation into Russell. Another, older, comparison is going back to Hamilton in Baku years ago when Vettel felt he’d been brake-tested. Again, no investigation of Hamilton at all. Last and most recent, Piastri felt that he did for the second restart what he’d done last time. There was no warning or investigation then. The stewards do give warnings sometimes, such as instructing a team to give a place back or the black-and-white flag for exceeding track limits, after which penalties are amassed.
Another factor that I disliked was the late call to bring in the safety car. This was at least partly why Piastri braked so hard. Verstappen, it seems, couldn’t see the safety car, which is one reason he went past Piastri initially. It reminds me a bit of Qatar when Norris got a penalty for speeding through double waved yellows which should never have been there. Similarly, Verstappen then spinning at the restart might have been an extra consideration for the stewards even though it should not have been.
Further back, Hulkenberg almost ploughed into the back of Stroll and had to take evasive action. But Piastri was under pressure because he had to let the safety car get away before he got back to racing speed, so while he might have braked too hard he had limited scope to be gentler. I do think it was an error of judgement, but a very understandable one, and jumping from nothing to a 10s penalty was too harsh, in my view. I can understand the case for a 5s penalty.
It might seem I’m banging on too much about this, but with a 5s penalty he might have won the race instead of Norris. This would’ve meant Piastri’s lead would’ve grown to 22 points rather than been cut down to just 8 points.
Anyway, regardless of how it should’ve gone, the decision was made.
Predictions for the Belgian Grand Prix 7m28s
And so to my predictions for Belgium.
For the sprint, I think Verstappen is going to take the win. He’s the best qualifier of the year and there will be limited time to get past him in a sprint. Norris and Piastri also have a great reason not to try anything too risky as a crash would not only lose them sprint points but potentially compromise their qualifying.
Come the qualifying for the Grand Prix I think Verstappen will get pole there as well. But I don’t think he’ll win. Piastri was more impressive last year and I expect him to claim the win in 2025. Joining him on the podium will be Norris and Leclerc. The Monegasque driver has had a few podium results this year and the Ferrari’s looking pretty good right now.
For midfield points, I’m going to back Hulkenberg here. He’s on a fantastic run of form and has always been better at classic circuits like Silverstone, Interlagos, and Spa than street circuits. I’m also backing Alonso, who has also enjoyed excellent results ever since his early season curse ended.
And my extra prediction is that one of the Haas drivers will make Q3.
F1 News 8m41s
F1 News.
You have probably already heard the joke about Horner having a performance clause in his contract: if Hulkenberg ever got a podium, he’d lose his job.
Horner had been team principal of Red Bull since the team arrived in the sport, and his decades in charge made him the most experienced boss on the grid. Last year there was much publicised controversy regarding allegations of inappropriate conduct, and although he was not found guilty of anything or formally punished this did see a huge split develop in the team. Part of the fallout from that was the departure of senior personnel, including the current Sauber team principal Jonathan Wheatley, and renowned designer Adrian Newey, who joined Aston Martin.
It was also clear the Verstappen camp were not on the same side as Horner. It seemed the team principal had weathered the storm, but his departure comes in the context of increasing rumours regarding Verstappen joining Mercedes (which would be very rough on Russell or Antonelli, but then Sainz getting turfed from Ferrari was rough too). Opinion is divided as to whether Horner going makes it more or less likely Verstappen’s leaving. One view is that he’s going as a consequence of Verstappen having already determined to leave, another is that Horner being axed was a price demanded by Verstappen’s side for him to stay.
There’s a lot of momentum behind rumours of Verstappen leaving for Mercedes but right now I think it’d make more sense for him to stay with Red Bull for a year to see the lie of the land in 2026. Although I think Mercedes will be at the sharp end, if he jumps ship and the Silver Arrows disappoint then it would be less than ideal.
Horner has been replaced as Red Bull team principal by Laurent Mekies, who previously held that role at Racing Bulls. Let’s hope he becomes the first man this year to get promoted to Red Bull and not regret it. At Racing Bulls, the team principal role is now being filled by Alan Permane, previously technical director.
Thank you all for listening. If you enjoyed the podcast then please leave a five star rating wherever you listen as that sort of thing helps the algorithm a lot. Next time, I’ll be looking back at how Spa went, and ahead to the Hungarian Grand Prix.
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