2004 Formula One Season Preview

The opening round of the 2004 FIA Formula One World Championship is just hours way. The F1 circus has converged upon Melbourne for the 2004 Australian Grand Prix on March 7th. For months now all ten teams have spent millions of hours and dollars preparing for the new season. Here is a preview of what to look for and what to expect from Formula One in 2004.

New Rules, New Drivers, and New Circuits
The rule changes for 2004 are not as dramatic as last season, but they will still have an impact on all of the teams and drivers. The biggest rule change is probably that a driver must use the same engine for the entire Grand Prix weekend or give up ten grid positions on race day. Engine changes after final qualifying will mean starting from the back of the grid. This was seen as a cost cutting measure but time will tell if it only drives up costs to achieve that kind of reliability. Another technical change is mandating minimum engine cover sizes, larger rear wing endplates for sponsors, and limiting the rear wing to just two main elements. Look for each team to find ways to bend but not break the new aerodynamics restrictions. In addition, launch control and fully automatic gear changing systems are banned for 2004.

The Grand Prix timetable has also been modified from last season's overhaul. Friday practice will consist of two, one-hour practice sessions, except for Monaco where the practice sessions traditionally take place on Thursday. The bottom six teams in the Constructors' Championship will be allowed to run a third car on Friday, but the driver is not allowed to have more than six F1 races under their belt. Saturday's schedule will include two, 45-minutes practice sessions followed by two rounds of qualifying. The first qualifying session will be run in the finishing order from the previous race, and the final session will be run just minutes afterwards beginning with the slowest driver from the earlier session out on the circuit first. The cars will still be held in Parc Fermé between qualifying and the race on Sunday.

The 2004 Formula One season will also see some new faces behind the wheel and some familiar ones with new teams. Felipe Massa returns to Sauber after a year of testing duties with Ferrari. The young Brazilian will be alongside Sauber newcomer Giancarlo Fisichella. The Italian driver's seat at Jordan was filled with Nick Heidfeld, who drove for Sauber the past two seasons. Heidfeld's teammate will be F1 rookie Giorgio Pantano, and another rookie, Christian Klien, will drive for Jaguar. Takuma Sato's season finale appearance with BAR will now be a season-long drive with the team. The Japanese driver spent a year with Jordan in 2002 before moving over to BAR in a testing role. Minardi will field a quasi-rookie duo of Gianmaria Bruni and Zsolt Baumgartner. Bruni has some limited F1 testing experience and Baumgartner filled in for two races at Jordan last year for a recovering Ralph Firman.

Formula One returns to Spa, much to the delight of everyone, and two new races in Bahrain and China mean a very grueling 18 race schedule. The newly built Bahrain International Circuit will host the new Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix in April. The brand new Shanghai International Circuit will play host to Formula One and 200,000 spectators for the first ever Chinese Grand Prix in September. Both circuits were designed by the FIA's approved circuit designer Hermann Tilke.

The off-again on-again status of the Canadian and French Grand Prixs only helped to make the schedule more fluid during the off-season. The FIA has also moved certain dates around the 2004 calendar. The United States Grand Prix has been moved from its late September date to June and the Brazilian Grand Prix has replaced Japan as the F1 season finale. F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone has also indicated that this will be the last year for the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola.

The Shark, The Walrus, and The Anteater
Formula One's best minds have been hard at work building their 2004 contenders. The result is a variety of different and unusual approaches to build a better, faster, and more agile car. Ferrari's F2004 may have dropped the shark-like gills from last year's championship winning car, but pre-season testing has revealed new innovations including shark-like teeth on the front wing.

The Williams BMW FW26's radical nose design surprised everyone at its Valencia unveiling in early January. But the tusk-nosed FW26 has shown promise in winter testing as a very formidable contender for the Drivers' and Constructors' Championships. McLaren Mercedes was the first of all the teams to hit the track with its new car. The anteater nosed MP4-19 borrows many characteristics from the ill-fated MP4-18, but the car's slow pace of late has even The Iceman, Kimi Raikkonen, a bit concerned.

Renault made the most of the Friday private testing sessions last year, and this year's R24 has all the signs of another race winner. The R24's new engine and radical side pod design has everyone in the F1 Paddock wondering if Renault can make a top three finish this year. Perhaps the biggest surprise of the winter testing season has been BAR Honda. The BAR Honda 006 has broken several track records and appears reliable, but it still remains unclear if the team has just been running light to attract some attention.

Meanwhile, Sauber has been getting a lot of mixed reactions for the C23's near look-alike design to last year's Ferrari 2003-GA. Sauber will already be running a Petronas-badged Ferrari under the engine cover and rumors in the F1 Paddock contend that there is even more sharing going on behind the scenes. Jaguar's R5 sports some aerodynamic changes but winter testing has brought mixed results. Toyota's TF104 is a completely new car from front to back, and the arrival of Renault's Mike Gascoyne as the team's new technical director can only help.

Jordan Ford and Minardi Cosworth are still two teams struggling to keep their spots on the F1 grid. Despite Eddie Jordan and Paul Stoddard's insistence that all is well, both men have been very busy in the off-season trying to raise funds and add sponsors. Jordan's EJ14 has some new chassis design changes and the team hopes the new 90-degree Cosworth CR-6 engine can be more reliable than last year. Minardi's greatest contribution to F1 may be Stoddard's ability to bring some of the best new talent into the sport.

Predictions, Hunches, and Wild Guesses
Ferrari is still the team to beat and Michael Schumacher is still the best driver in the sport. But the Scuderia have done a lot of private testing without the other teams present, and questions still remain about the off-season improvement of Bridgestone's tires. Last year showed that they can be beaten and there is an even larger cast of worthy contenders to deal with this season.

Williams BMW will make an all out push this season to take the Constructors' Championship. Juan Pablo Montoya is already signed to drive for McLaren next season and Ralf Schumacher wants a pay raise instead of the pay cut the team is proposing. Frank Williams and Patrick Head have shown in the past that they care more about the success of the team than the financial well being of their drivers. I expect them to pull out all the stops to win before they have to bring in new faces for 2005.

McLaren is probably the biggest question mark going into the 2004 season. They were very quick in early testing but have since been hit with reliability problems. Is the McLaren sandbagging it or are their real troubles brewing at the Woking-based team? Look for Renault and BAR to make a major effort to bump McLaren from their top three status. All signs point to Fernando Alonso getting another win for Renault and this should be BAR's Jenson Button's year to get a podium or two.

Jaguar and Toyota really need to start showing some results. Mark Webber has already proven that he can drive a sub-par car into the points at Jaguar. His new teammate, Christian Klien, will need to step up to the challenge and bring in some points for the leaping cat. Toyota has shown they have the engine power to win if they can just figure out their chassis problems, but it might take another year for Mike Gascoyne to work his magic. Sauber's interesting relationship with Ferrari might be the one thing that keeps them in the hunt for points this season.

Jordan is quite possibly in worse shape than anyone knows and Minardi's Paul Stoddard will probably produce more surprises in the pressroom than his cars will on the track. For Jordan, their one hope is having the same Cosworth engine as the factory Jaguar team. Reliability problems plagued the team last season, and their fortunes could be tied to Jaguar with this year's lump. Minardi is the ultimate underdog and it doesn't take much, like their provisional qualifying performance at Magny-Cours last season, for everyone in the F1 Paddock to cheer them on.

The single-engine rule per weekend could end up deciding the final standings in the Drivers' and Constructors' Championships. Teams will limit revs on Friday to preserve the engine and most of the work will be focused on getting the car's setup just right. Looking back over the past few seasons this rule would have had a serious impact on every single team from top to bottom. Because only the bottom six teams in the Constructors' standings can run a third car on Fridays, look for them to push things to the limit without reliability concerns. Reliability will mean everything this season.

The changes to the qualifying format will also bring strategy into play. Teams will essentially have two options: Run in qualifying trim and then race trim or make both runs with a race setup. Last seaon proved that a clean lap can be just as important as a fast one. The re-banning of launch control should also make the start of each race a bit more tense as well. If 2004 is anywhere close to being as exciting as 2003, then we should all be in store for a great Formula One season.