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Formula 1

Motorsport

Thoughts on Australian Jack Doohan son of former 500cc World Champion Mick now set for his big break in Formula 1 next year with the Alpine F1 Team alongside Pierre Gasly

by Sports Benches

This is the moment we’ve been waiting for all year long as the Alpine F1 Team have finally settled their 2nd seat to replace the Haas-bound Esteban Ocon today for their upcoming 2025 Formula One Season alongside Frenchman Pierre Gasly and it’s none other than our Aussie own Jack Doohan from the Gold Coast, Queensland. His big announcement today won’t impact Alpine’s future plans that much in the meantime going into the new engine rules era from 2026 at Enstone when it’s looking more and more likely now that they will ditch their own Renault engines by becoming a privateer outfit with Mercedes-Benz. 

Then it remains to see what happens after that if Alpine still wants to be a Formula 1 outfit after 2026 as they could either be morphed into Hitech since Oliver Oakes has just taken over the Team Principal job at Alpine or else Andretti can take over for at least $1 billion dollars & they can finally race Formula 1 when the sport doesn’t feel confident about expansion at this time.

Great to hear that Alpine has made an excellent choice by bringing Doohan into a full-time race seat where he might not have collected a season championship so far in his career but he too can do well across qualifying and race day with a few wins under his belt as proved in Formula 3 and Formula 2 in the past. Don’t forget he’s also the son of former legendary 500cc motorcycle Grand Prix champion Mick Doohan as sure he has the family racing calibre to make his mark albeit at the different highest levels of Motorsport in four-wheels of Formula 1 rather than two-wheels which is MotoGP.

Yes, Mick Schumacher was also in the mix having also took part in a top-secret test recently for Alpine alongside Doohan where they were both family friends for a long time with Mick being named after Jack’s dad while Jack was given a go-kart by Mick’s dad Michael who won so many World Championships throughout his career as hope is all well with him following his unfortunate skiing accident a decade ago.

But again, even though Mick first came into F1 with the Formula 3 and 2 championships, he didn’t set the world alight when he was at Haas a few years ago & if he wants to go back at the top-level again, then taking the risk at Audi which is currently Sauber in the short-term under Ferrari engines would be his last best hope ahead of its big break in 2026 with fellow German Nico Hulkenberg.

At the end of the day, it’s up for Doohan to score regular Top 7-10s with some podiums or even 1-2 wins onboard since there’s only 20 Formula 1 seats to battle upfront nowadays. Let’s hope he does well with our best backing from Australia as he will be the third driver there on the grid alongside McLaren’s Oscar Piastri and also Racing Bulls’ Daniel Ricciardo if Riccardo can keep his ride within the Red Bull family next season.

Depending on Sergio Perez’s performance later this year, we could see Ricciardo going back to Red Bull again or else he will be given the flick with NZ’s Liam Lawson getting a full-time ride after all in Ricciardo’s current spot at Racing Bulls.

Looks like F1 is growing across the Trans-Tasman in both Australia and New Zealand with as many as four drivers on the grid and with Doohan, it remains to be seen which race number he could take ahead of his F1 race debut next season.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on Daniel Ricciardo’s Hulu Formula One sitcom project getting a pilot order earlier this week now titled Downforce

by Sports Benches

Also this week, ABC Signature has one of their new sitcom pilots being approved to the pilot stage by the Hulu streaming service and it’s Formula 1 related called Downforce with current RB Visa CashApp driver Daniel Ricciardo involved as one of the executive producers alongside Alec Berg, Adam Cortnee, Lionsgate and Temple Hill Entertainment. It will be lead by a female who was suddenly required to oversee the family-run racing team as she will need to make some tough choices whether if she will continue running it or step aside that would impact the future of the organisation and her family’s legacy.

So a it’s bit like Claire Williams taking over her famous dad’s Formula 1 team during the last decade when he needed to take a back seat before it was sold to Doriton Capital back in 2020, which marked a new era for Williams and then Sir Frank sadly passed away a year later. Maybe this might be based on a true story since Formula 1 has grown a lot in America off the back of the seasoned Netflix documentary Drive to Survive over the last 5-6 years. The cast and its format (thinking it’s going to be single-camera) remains to be seen at this stage, having first developed the show when Ricciardo was involved with Hulu a year ago. Yes, he was out of a drive at the time as even though his results this year might not be good any longer after he unexpectedly replaced Nyck De Vries nearly a year ago at Red Bull’s sister team (then Alpha Tauri), he will still have a job within the sport where he’s always been popular with the fans when he raced for Red Bull, Renault and McLaren for many years.

Now let’s see if Downforce can be put into series which isn’t guaranteed but should things go well later this year, we the original airing would be on Hulu sometime in 2025 with the International distribution as per ABC Signature being available via Disney +. Yes, this project also would’ve been perfect for ABC on TV who also airs selected Formula 1 races during the year thanks to Disney property ESPN but they want more new multi-camera sitcoms going forward that isn’t expensive. So best to build a following on Hulu rather than seeing things being unexpectedly axed after a few episodes if they’re really that lucky.

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Motorsport

Formula 1, an unexpected early mechanical DNF from Red Bull’s Max Verstappen paves a Ferrari 1-2 finish with Spaniard Carlos Sainz Jr. now a first time winner at Albert Park

by Sports Benches

We didn’t see that coming but we now have a new Australian Grand Prix winner for 2024 and his name is Carlos Sainz Jr who drives for Scuderia Ferrari off the back of these unexpected early retirements from reigning champion and last year’s winner Max Verstappen (Red Bull-Honda RBPT) as well as Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes whose team-mate George Russell also suffered a late race crash). He too had a great race for the majority unchallenged with team-mate Charles Leclerc rounding off a 1-2 Ferrari finish since the 2022 season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix. Looks like it will be Ferrari v Red Bull for the championship now with Sainz Jr (-11 points) and Leclerc (-4 points) not far behind Verstappen (currently on 51 with back-to-back wins) in the drivers’ standings. Plus, fellow Red Bull driver Sergio Perez has still yet to win this year despite back-to-back 2nd places in the hope of going one better that would help him keep his ride for another couple of years after he just finished 5th (-5 points).

For the Aussies, We also hoped to at least see one on the podium but Oscar Piastri didn’t do bad though just outside the Top 3 places in 4th behind his McLaren-Mercedes team-mate Lando Norris, while Daniel Ricciardo finished not far from the Top 10 in 12th despite being a lap down for Visa CashApp RB-Honda RBPT since he was in a midfield race machine.

Also, shoutout to the two Haas-Ferrari cars just rounding off the Top 10 points in Nico Hulkenberg (9th) and Kevin Magnussen (10th). So does Ricciardo’s team-mate Yuki Tusnoda from Japan after he collected a few points in 8th just behind the Aston Martin duo of Lance Stroll (7th) & Fernando Alonso (6th). And although things are still going slow at the moment over at Jack Doohan’s Alpine-Renault squad with Esteban Ocon finishing last on track (16th), but Pierre Gasly did benefit from these early race retirements on what has been an okay 13th placed finish. It remains to be seen if Alpine’s form will turn things around sooner rather than later as a mid-season driver change remains unlikely for now but Doohan hopes his time will come most likely next year depending on the team’s commitment to the sport & if Ocon and/or Gasly leaves for a better race team like Mercedes and Red Bull. F1 will now go from Albert Park in Melbourne to Suzuka in Japan who will now host early rather than later during the season as the next race (Round 4 of 22) will take place after Easter on the weekend of Sunday 7th April 2024.

If you wish to follow all other races after watching this annual Australian race since it’s free-to-air protected, Fox Sports/Kayo will be the only place here to watch live & on-demand with next day race highlights available for free thanks to Kayo Freebies.

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Motorsport

All you need to know ahead of next weekend’s 2024 Australian Grand Prix Formula 1 Event at Albert Park in Melbourne

by Sports Benches

The 2024 Australian Grand Prix Formula 1 Round is not far away beginning next Friday at the streets of Albert Park in Melbourne. It will be the third race of a long 24 event calendar with 3 x reigning champion Max Verstappen who is outstanding so far with back-to-back pole and race wins in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia for Red Bull-Honda RBPT. So this is the man to beat as he’s also the defending winner here, having done so for the first time last year on what has been a caution filled race that led into a late finish around 5.30pm local time. Don’t forget we could see another talented youngster again in Britain’s Oliver Bearman who filled in well for the ill Carlos Sainz last time round (Saudi Arabia) for Ferrari where he finished 7th. What’s even better that we will have two Aussie drivers on the grid again for the first time since 2013 where high-flying youngster Oscar Piastri and the experienced Daniel Ricciardo will be flying the flag for McLaren-Mercedes and Visa CashApp RB-Honda RBPT respectively. There hasn’t been a home winner since Alan Jones back in 1980 during his Championship-winning season for Williams as it’s unlikely we will see Piastri end that long-running drought at this stage but you never know.

But wait there’s more, Alpine’s Test/Reverse driver Jack Doohan and his legendary motorcycle grand prix dad Mick will also be stopping by at the same time where they will do a bit of their own fun event together with Jack driving a Benetton B200 and Mick riding a Honda RCV213 production bike around the track. While it’s a bummer that Jack won’t be given a chance for next Friday’s free practice sessions since he chose not to race anything this year after two good seasons in Formula 2, we will get to see more of him throughout this year – mainly during the European leg races. Considering Alpine’s disastrous start of 2024, hope Jack can be given a chance and get to be on race days if things don’t work out by the middle of the year. But again, it’s a difficult sport to get into considering you would need lots of financial support in order to get your foot into the door out of a 20-car competition. So Alpine should correct the mistake they did with Piastri two years ago regarding the contract dispute/next season’s driver line-up and have Doohan replacing Esteban Ocon if he goes to Mercedes or even Pierre Gasly earlier than expected who is sitting last right now in the drivers’ standings behind American Logan Sargeant from Williams.

And lastly, the broadcast details on where you can tune in if you’re unable to watch the race in-person. Fox Sports with its streaming platform Kayo has the exclusive rights to every round of the season from practice, qualifying, some sprint races and the all-important race days Live and on-demand. They will simulcast the Sky Sports feed all along and if you want to keep up to date with Formula 1 as the season goes on, look out for free-to-view highlights clips sometime on a Monday after each Grand Prix. Also, as part of the current anti-siphoning rule required to have the annual Aus GP event on free-to-air by the Government, Network 10 will be back onboard for this event for the 20th year and the 22nd year covering this sport if you count 2020-21 being COVID related years when the sport was unable to race here at the time. They will once again have their studio coverage as well as their own commentary since 10 had to share the rights with Fox back in 2015 where they will air all three days of the Australian GP event live. This is the second year out of five under the current updated Formula 1 broadcast deal here where 10 & Fox Sports/Kayo are not going anywhere right now with the next rights cycle coming up from 2028.

All in all, it’s going to be an amazing event with the Supercars, Formula 2 and 3 also on show amongst other categories in the lead up towards the main 56-lap race next Sunday afternoon at 3pm AEDT.

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Motorsport

What to look forward to from Jack Doohan despite not racing this year in the hope of earning a seat at Alpine F1 Team in 2025

by Sports Benches

Image Reference: Lukas Raich via Wikipedia, CC BY 4.0 International

Another Aussie driver to keep an eye on other than Oscar Piastri & Daniel Ricciardo is 21-year-old Jack Doohan, who will simply be backing up for Alpine this season in a simulator and reserve role – just like New Zealand’s Liam Lawson for Visa CashApp RB despite his good limited outings while Ricciardo recovered from a broken hand last year. His racing record through the ranks might not be the best but he too can bag a few podiums and race wins, having gone so close (runner-up) three years ago in Formula 3 as well as finishing 3rd last year following an underwhelming first half campaign in Formula 2. He could’ve also gone over to the World Endurance Championship or even attempt IndyCar such as the Indianapolis 500. But don’t think going for the Triple Crown or achieving anything outside Formula 1 will mean that much to them these days as this is still the top ranked Motorsport competition in the world & that is something Jack would want to do on race days in 2025.

Lewis Hamilton recently confirmed he will be leaving Mercedes for Ferrari next year & someone from Alpine in Esteban Ocon could potentially be his replacement alongside George Russell. Let’s hope Jack can do well when being given the chance on Friday practice sessions throughout the year in the hope that Alpine will be worthy of giving him a shot next year, so they can forget about having previous conflicts with Piastri who hopped onto McLaren instead at the end of the 2022 season.

If not, Williams should try him again had Logan Sargent been unable to obtain enough Super Licence points that would’ve denied him a 2023 Formula 1 seat. But now he is still not getting up to speed following a very poor rookie year as another bad season would see him head out of the door for good. Let’s hope Jack can be like his legendary motorcycle grand prix father Mick who won so much back in his day but through a very different discipline and that will be the highest levels in Formula 1.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on the returning Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix race only being shown on ESPN & ESPN + & not on ABC this weekend 

by Sports Benches

This weekend, Formula One will hit the streets of Las Vegas for the first time since the 80s and it’s going to be huge under the lights & also late on a Saturday night (10pm PT/1am ET) rather than the usual Sunday afternoon. Las Vegas will be the third US-based F1 event of the year after Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas last month as well as Miami earlier in May.They won’t go up and down again at Caesar’s Palace as it will take place around the Las Vegas Strip & also the MSG Sphere where one random guest would have the whole view’s access of the track based on top of a screen (would love to a see his reaction to that lap-by-lap from start to finish!!) ahead of everyone watching on through the grandstands. But only thing missing is that ABC won’t show the Las Vegas GP race despite having some build up content via Good Morning America. It will instead be via cable on ESPN as well as paid streaming through ESPN +. We would’ve love to have the pre-race show straight after the local news at 11.35pm ahead of the 1am ET race start through to 3am, but then half the county across the East Coast would be in bed by then while half the people in the West are still staying up until midnight by partying big for this special race. 

If the race started at 8pm PT/11pm ET, then that might make sense for ABC to round off its Saturday night sports programming straight after the College Football. Lots of people always stay up until 12-1am as it’s the middle of the weekend. But it looks like that it makes sense to have repeat programming rather than having just the coast tuning in to watch the race between 1-3am ET just because some people are unable to watch it by having to sleep past midnight. It’s a hard call when Formula 1 is a World Championship that mainly suits the European audience as let’s hope the continued rise of the sport in America will unlock more potential with the hope of Andretti Global-Cadillac coming in as the 11th team in 2025 or 2026, which would mean a bit more free-to-air exposure by having the Las Vegas Grand Prix being shown at last on ABC someday.

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Motorsport

F1 live, Oscar Piastri follows up his 2nd podium finish just outside the winner’s circle of Max Verstappen for McLaren-Mercedes in Qatar

by Sports Benches

Oh so close but what a way to bring up a P2 finish that follows up from his career first podium finish of 3rd during the previous round in Japan two weeks ago by Oscar Piastri for #4 McLaren-Mercedes.

He has definitely benefited the opening lap Mercedes’ team-mates crash of Lewis Hamilton & George Russell that saw Lewis had to retire early where Oscar gained a few spots from his starting place of 6th to 2nd. Although he wasn’t able to stop the now 3 x World Champion Max Verstappen who continues to dominate the whole field by a comfortable 4 second gap, but it’s still an unreal weekend though to reflect in the end with another podium finish.

From a supposed 3rd in qualifying being wiped out by race control to winning all of the sprint formats & to now posting his best result of 2nd – hats off to Oscar on an excellent drive with credit of a front row race car being prepared by McLaren.

There’s only five races left with the United States Grand Prix next up in two weeks time at the Circuit of The Americas in Austin, Texas. Let’s hope Oscar can follow up a podium finish again but this time he wins a full Grand Prix for the first time.

The last time a McLaren driver won a race was fellow Aussie Daniel Ricciardo from the 2021 Italian Grand Prix. So hope the next McLaren winner will be an Aussie again but with Piastri being on top of the podium as we’re going to see a brilliant finish to his rookie year in the hope of being ready to challenge Max next year.

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Motorsport

F1 News Live, Australian Oscar Piastri gets his first Sprint Race win for McLaren in Qatar

by Sports Benches

Wow!! What a day it has been from Australia’s own Oscar Piastri who dominated both the Sprint qualifying shootout & the 19-lap race itself for McLaren-Mercedes at the Qatar Grand Prix in Lusail. He had a great opening few laps & although he lost a spot to George Russell (Mercedes) for a while, but Oscar managed to regain top spot off Russell & stayed there comfortably this time through the end with the win. 

How good was that to see Oscar record his next best moment in Formula 1 as a full race win will come his way sooner rather than later hopefully to wrap it up tomorrow at 4 AM AEDT time. We thought he will be starting 3rd, but will start 6th instead because his final lap time was invalid due to exceeding track limits which was also applied to his team-mate Lando Norris.

Regardless of that, he will hope to make the most of his starting position through a decent race car by challenging up front against the Mercedes & Red Bull cars including now 3 x World Champion Max Verstappen from the Netherlands.

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Formula 1 News, Update on Andretti Autosport’s bid to enter as the 11th team when it comes to the commercial side

by Sports Benches

A few days after the FIA has accepted Andretti Autosport’s application to enter Formula 1 as the possible 11th team, things didn’t go off to a good start when it comes to entering commercial discussions with the current 10 teams & the sports promoter Liberty Media itself. So far McLaren is 100% supportive through boss Zak Brown who has a great business relationship with Andretti in Supercars here, as well as Renault’s factory team Alpine as a honour to initially supply Andretti their engines if accepted. Then Aston Martin said that if the sport’s ain’t broken don’t fix it despite initially being happy to see Andretti enter the sport last year, but then probably Cadillac joining forces with Andretti at the start of this year saw their heads turn & say it’s best we stay with 10 teams. Meanwhile, Ferrari is not convinced what value Andretti can offer to this sport when a few teams didn’t do so well before shutting down last decade between 2010-2016.

Plus, Williams said that the price money pot will get smaller if they join in, as well as having to look after their big 900 + staff first where they’re happy with the direction F1 is heading right now. Although they wouldn’t be against having a new manufacturer like Cadillac/General Motors, just not a new team like Andretti. The score is 2-2 all right now as don’t think any other existing 10 teams will lend its support to Andretti. Red Bull/Alpha Tauri’s concern is the distribution of profits which is what WillIiams said the other day, while Haas would still straight out just say no like Aston Martin. All we can hope for now is for Toto Wolff from Mercedes to be 100% convinced on what Andretti has to offer in Formula 1 like the resources, budget, etc. I’m sure that will help Ferrari & Alfa Romeo/Sauber change their minds on how a potential 11th entry will look like when competing v 10 teams on-track.

The good news is that the 10 teams will have no say on whether or not if Andretti is the correct 11th team to join F1 as we can hope from Liberty Media now is for them to be on the same page as Andretti. That way, not they can work something out in order to give Andretti the opportunity to make a competitive name for themselves in Formula 1, but also help ensure the current 10 teams some stability when it comes to the commercial value as well. So the anti-dilution fee will no longer settle at $200 million, they should instead work at a counter offer of $400 million for the first year, then $500-600 million afterwards if Andretti can post regular Top 7-10s + occasion Top 3s – everyone wins.

Growth/Expansion should be taken one step at a time. Since F1 has reduced a 10-team series back in 2018, that Netflix documentary + seeing all teams being competitive saw its value rise overtime that comes with 2-3 US races now (Austin, Miami & Las Vegas). That is something Rugby Australia & Super Rugby needs to learn if they wish to become competitive by winning games again by having three strong teams instead of five right now. A US-based team is something the sport’s fans love to see as the next step, we just hope to see both Andretti & Liberty Media reach an agreement in three ways:

  • Ensure the 10 teams their financial security by growing the prize money pot as long as Andretti is willing to pay double the anti-dilution fee of $400-500 million.
  • Give Andretti the chance to show its worth in Formula 1 from their own home in the US when it comes to a manufacturing, resources & competitive standpoint.
  • And keep F1’s value intact while growing even further where all 11 teams thrive that will in turn have a lot more US-based fans alongside Andretti as the years goes by.

It’s going to be a difficult couple of months but let’s hope Andretti will finally be accepted before taking their next steps towards producing their first Formula 1 car at the earliest given time possible.

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Thoughts on Andretti being formally approved by the FIA as the 11th Formula 1 team yesterday but it’s not over yet with a new battle coming up from the 10 teams

by Sports Benches

Another huge news out of Motorsport yesterday that the FIA governing body, who runs Formula 1, has formally approved Andretti’s bid to enter the top flight as the next possible 11th team. 

It’s been a long process so far where they passed the first two phases with one final big hurdle left, which is the sport’s commercial group where they run the media side of things including global broadcast rights as well as looking after the existing ten teams when it comes to prize money, etc. We’ll have to really, really wait & see if all of these teams will be sold of Andretti’s idea in the hope of having really good competitive on-track competition alongside a really good race car.

So far most teams are against it where they’re happy where they are right now while expressing concerns of having a smaller cut of the prize money. But at the same time, Andretti is 100% serious about being competitive where they’re not bereft of financial support while hoping to take America’s relationship with Formula 1 to the next level thanks to their own team.

How good would it be where Andretti is also constructing their world-class headquarters right now that is akin to other big Motorsport powerhouses like McLaren? That would be a huge boost to their Formula 1 goals if the ten teams do give them a chance that can reflect Andretti’s all-round value on the world stage. Although half of the resources will be based in Europe, but they can be the first team to build a Formula 1 car right at their own home in Fishers, Indianapolis.

Yes, that can be a bit odd since all of the Formula 1 cars are currently built across Europe. But it also be great if the US has their own cutting edge of the way they run Motorsport which is huge & I for one would love to see Andretti-Cadillac show the sport how it’s done for their own country. Speaking of the US, they will of course save a spot for a home-grown driver which is most likely going to be Colton Herta, while a team-mate will be experienced racer like Daniel Ricciardo, who is so popular over there even though he’s one of us from Australia. It’s going to take time for the 10 teams to really pay attention to Andretti’s wish of competing in Formula 1 by saying yes this time, but let’s hope it happens before they start racing in 2025 or 2026.

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