LAS VEGAS — Later this week, the cars will barrel down the infamous Las Vegas Strip, dancing under the lights.
A few teams, like Alpine and Sauber, have adjusted their liveries for the showstopper weekend, and some drivers, like Esteban Ocon, have changed their helmet designs. But all eyes will be at the top of the grid with two championship battles nearing the end.
Max Verstappen holds a 62-point lead over Lando Norris going into the Las Vegas Grand Prix weekend, and the Dutchman could wrap up the title this weekend. And then there’s the constructors’ championship fight, which has drastically changed in recent race weekends. McLaren still leads with 593 points, but Ferrari is just 36 points behind. Carlos Sainz said in Austin that he anticipated Mexico and Las Vegas would be good tracks for the Prancing Horse, and a week later, he won the Mexico City Grand Prix. Red Bull, who started the year looking like it was going to pick up where it left off in a dominant 2023, has slid back, now sitting third with 544 points, 49 points off of McLaren.
It’s all to play for in Las Vegas. Before it’s time for “light’s out and away we go,” we answered a few questions from our pre-race mailbag.
Editor’s note: Questions are lightly edited for clarity and length.
At which race is Max Verstappen going to ice his fourth championship? Brazil showed yet again that he’s the best. — Brian M.
It’s a toss-up whether Verstappen can wrap up his fourth world championship in Las Vegas this weekend or if he’ll need to wait a few more days and face a second straight coronation in Qatar instead.
Verstappen’s victory in Brazil was, to my mind, the greatest win of his F1 career to date. It was a huge break point in the championship battle against Lando Norris. The McLaren driver had built up some huge momentum, particularly by taking pole at Interlagos, while Verstappen had to start 17th. It turned us from considering if this title battle might run all the way to Abu Dhabi to bracing for it to be clinched in Las Vegas.
The simple version is that if Verstappen finishes ahead of Norris on Saturday night in Las Vegas, he will be crowned world champion for a fourth time. The complication here is that besides Brazil, where the rain leveled the field and then brought out the best of Verstappen’s natural talents, Red Bull has not appeared to have a pace advantage over McLaren. The Austin upgrade helped draw Verstappen closer in the dry weather by giving him greater comfort, but right now, I’d still tip McLaren and Ferrari to be a step ahead of Red Bull this weekend.
Norris needs to outscore Verstappen by three points to keep the title going to Qatar. But there, it will be a formality, one would imagine. Verstappen is very much on the brink of the championship, but if I had to take a punt on when it will happen, I would say Qatar, not Las Vegas. — Luke Smith
With Alpine, Haas, and RB now as close as they are … who comes out on top? — Craig R.
I love this question because I can see a world where any of the three could come out on top. Five points cover all three teams.
Alpine has taken strides since the start of the season when it scored just 14 points in the first 20 rounds. But come the 21st grand prix in Brazil, the team hit the jackpot during a bonkers race. Alpine has made progress with its car development, and the duo of Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly can now be a point of threat. But can Alpine maintain the position, given how strong Haas has been this year?
Haas arguably could be viewed as the “best of the rest” this year considering the steps it has taken under Ayao Komatsu. From Monza to Mexico, the team scored 19 of its 46 points, showing consistency across five different race tracks and both normal and mixed conditions. It outscored every team aside from the top four in that span. Haas’ improvement comes down to its car development and being on the right track.
Kevin Magnussen and Haas are two points ahead of RB in the constructors’ championship. (Clive Rose/Getty Images)
That doesn’t mean Haas is out of the woods.
“Well, you can’t be confident at all,” Kevin Magnussen said on Wednesday. “You know, we were not even thinking about Alpine, really, in that battle, and then suddenly they’re ahead of us. So I think we feel like we’re in a good place with the car. And recently we’ve kind of consistently been in the run for points. Now that Aston Martin are struggling, there’s actually some points available at each race. So, it’s exciting.”
And then there’s RB. It’s been a bit chaotic for the team, switching the driver lineup with six races to go. Regardless of your feelings about the swap, Liam Lawson has scored points in two out of the three race weekends, and with how tight the competition is, every point matters.
Finishing in the top 10 has become harder this season. It’s nearly a given that Verstappen, the Ferrari duo, McLaren and Mercedes will score points on any given weekend unless a fluke happens. It’s hard to pick which team — Alpine, Haas or RB — will come out on top. Considering the track record, Haas may be the best bet. — Madeline Coleman
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Should Ricciardo have been given a chance with Red Bull Racing? Could the better car have possibly let him show something? — Craig R.
I can see an argument for either side, but there is a massive caveat and reminder that the RB20 went in the wrong development direction. Sergio Pérez has struggled — so much that if you took his points totals away from Red Bull’s, Verstappen has scored enough points that Red Bull would still be ahead of Mercedes (393 points versus 382).
Ricciardo was not exactly thriving at RB either, particularly in the teammate-to-teammate comparison with Yuki Tsunoda. So the question is how much of an upgrade would Ricciardo have been compared to Pérez? Rather than a mid-season replacement-type scenario, it would have been interesting to see a test where Pérez and Ricciardo were in equal machinery. — Madeline Coleman
Amidst reports of vastly depressed demand for the Las Vegas Grand Prix in addition to a similar story for Miami, can the U.S. really host three races long term? And if not, does Miami or Las Vegas fold first? — Michael R.
I’m not sure I’d agree with characterizing it as a “vastly depressed demand” for Las Vegas or Miami. Last month, Las Vegas GP CEO Renee Wilm said ticket sales were “pretty consistent with what we did expect” going into year two and that she anticipated many fans would want to wait until after the election before committing to buying tickets. Las Vegas also has a reputation for being a last-minute market.
To meet that, the price of a number of tickets has dropped – one initiative was a 44 percent discount in a nod to Lewis Hamilton’s race number – perhaps pointing to reduced demand and a need to gee up sales. But when I put that to Emily Prazer, the chief commercial officer of F1 and the Las Vegas GP, in a media session today, she explained that plans had always been in place.
“It was actually a lot more planned than people, I think, or the market or the perception of it was,” Prazer said. “It was really, really successful. I think we did like 4,000 tickets in three days. So it was really positive, and we were really happy with it.”
The demand is definitely there for three races in the long term, I believe. F1 is in a really good spot in the United States, and with “Drive to Survive” remaining such a success and the Apple movie coming out next year, I think there can still be another uptick. It’s a big, diverse country, and all three races cater to very different fans.
“All of the different grands prix play into it, we all have different identities and very different strategies,” Prazer said of the three races. “We are all very close, we work really well together. Miami was here last week. They were helping point out things I might have missed, there is nothing but complete autonomy between all three of us to figure out how we all play together but hopefully you will see the difference between the three as well.”
Year two in Las Vegas will be an interesting one, particularly lacking the novelty factor of last year, but I’ve already met quite a few fans who are in town for the first time and excited for the race weekend. – Luke Smith
(Top photo of Max Verstappen / Sem Van Der Wal / ANP / Sipa USA)
