The McLaren drivers put more distance between themselves and the competition at the last round in Miami.
What turn will the championship take as Formula 1 begins a run of races on three consecutive weekends? What effect will Alpine’s dramatic double-departure have on their form?Those talking points plus more for this weekend’s race are covered below.
All change at Alpine
There’s no doubt which team has gone through the biggest shake-up since the last round. Alpine’s decision to drop Jack Doohan was expected for months, but the departure of team principal Oliver Oakes was not.
While the arrival of Franco Colapinto will delight his many supporters, he will find himself in a situation that’s little more favourable than when he joined Williams (coincidentally, on the series’ last visit to Italy last year, at Monza). Alpine have collected just seven points so far and are looking over their shoulders to Sauber behind them.
In their announcement confirming Colapinto’s arrival, Alpine indicated he has just five races to prove himself before they reconsider their options. But he’s believed to be favoured by Briatore, so expect he’ll get a decent chance to prove himself, and isn’t likely to find himself shunted aside for practice sessions so the team can run a local driver.
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Arrivederci to Imola?
It’s not hard to see why, even ignoring the convenient detail that it happens to be the home city of F1 team principal Stefano Domenicali. Italy is not short of passionate Ferrari fans and the latest iteration of the Imola circuit is a little closer to the classic, high-speed original than the chicane-blighted version used after 1995.
But the race’s deal expires after this year and Domenicali indicated it is unlikely to return. This is likely to be the last time for a while F1 cars race in anger around Piratella, Acque Minerale, Rivazza and the rest.
Extra-soft tyre arrives
Pirelli has devised a new, extra-soft tyre compound for the 2025 season. F1’s official tyre supplier originally described this as “a softer compound especially for street circuits”, yet it has chosen this permanent circuit with several medium-speed corners for its introduction.
The decision to introduce the C6 at this race makes it the third consecutive round at which Pirelli has selected tyres one stage softer than those seen last year. This was done in the hope it would provoke more pit stops and more varied strategies, but had little effect at Jeddah and Miami. Pirelli have said they expect teams will stick to the C4 and C5 for race stints.
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Italy’s new F1 star
Could Andrea Kimi Antonelli change that? His first half-dozen appearances in an F1 car have done much to justify Mercedes’ faith in his abilities.
He arrives at his first home race having scored his first F1 pole position – albeit for a sprint race – and posted steadily improving results. He could well be in with a shout of a podium finish this weekend. What kind of reception will the 18-year-old receive at what could be the only F1 race he contests at the track just an hour’s drive from his native Bologna – even if he is driving for the ‘wrong’ team?
Ferrari’s woes
Who will get a warmer reaction from the Imola fans: Italy’s new driver Antonelli or Ferrari’s new driver Lewis Hamilton?
Despite their star off-season arrival, Ferrari have given their home fans little to celebrate so far this year. A strategic mis-step in Melbourne was followed by a double disqualification in Shanghai. Charles Leclerc grafted for a brilliant podium finish at Jeddah, then the team was embarrassingly beaten by Williams while it fumbled team orders in Miami.
Even at this early stage in the season, Leclerc and Hamilton know it will take a major shift in the competitive order for them to stand a chance in the championship. There have been rumours of an upgrade package for this weekend, however, and if Ferrari can replicate the kind of well-judged tweak they made in the second half of last season, their home race may be a happier one.
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Verstappen and Piastri seek four in a row
In Miami, McLaren produced a win of dispiriting dominance for their rivals. It may have been an outlier as far as the season so far is concerned, but they clearly have a formidable advantage in particularly hot races.
However Verstappen will go to Imola knowing it is exactly the kind of circuit where he could undermine their advantage. Overtaking is extremely difficult and pole position is extremely important. Verstappen has made a habit of nicking pole from the McLarens by tiny margins this year.
If he’s going to do it again, he could do with the kind of slipstream he gained from Nico Hulkenberg last year. But will his team mate Yuki Tsunoda, or any other driver required or inclined to help him out, be available to lend a hand in Q3?
Pit safety
Ahead of the Miami round there was some chatter the FIA might increase the pit lane speed limit at certain circuits. Doing so would reduce the time lost making a pit stop and therefore encourage teams to consider more multi-stop strategies, which might create more varied racing.
Imola exemplifies this problem. The bypassing of the Variante Bassa chicane since 2020 means coming into the pits at this track costs more time than anywhere else on the calendar.
However it’s doubtful much appetite for increasing pit lane speed limits will remain after the scenes at Miami, where Red Bull waved Verstappen’s car out into the side of Antonelli’s, and only the excellent reactions of both drivers spared mechanics from injury.
In order to reduce the risk to mechanics it would surely be wiser to limit the number which may perform a pit stop, as is done in other series, instead of crowding the pit lane with hundreds of extra, unnecessary, vulnerable bodies. Yes, it would make pit stops slower, which is the exact opposite of what some in F1 want, but the safety of the participants is more important than the debatable improvement to racing achieved by increasing the pit lane speed limit – a vital change introduced precisely because of a dangerous incident in the Imola pit lane 31 years ago.
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Are you going to the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix?
If you’re heading to Italy for this weekend’s race, we want to hear from you:
Who do you think will be the team to beat in the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix? Have your say below.
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2025 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix
- Antonelli was tiring from home race at Imola attention by Friday – Wolff
- Ferrari struggling to recreate set-up which “worked well” in Shanghai – Hamilton
- Verstappen told Red Bull to use Tsunoda before “hold him up” call
- ‘Saturdays have been mine for years but for some reason it’s drifted away’ – Norris
- “Plan C?”: Why McLaren only got their strategy right for one driver at Imola
David
13th May 2025, 8:41
Pleased you mentioned the pit lane incidents. A timely reminder that the limit is there for safety, not to spice up the racing.
Hopefully the misguided idea to increase the limit will never be spoken of again.
JackL
13th May 2025, 17:49
Completely agree. Increasing the pit lane speed limit is a terrible idea. What they need is to change the pit lane layout and orientation. Canada comes to mind. The pit lane loss is only 15seconds because it skips the last chicane, and the first corner. More pit lanes should be adjusted similarly to allow for less lap time loss without compromising safety.
BasCB (@bascb)
14th May 2025, 9:36
Yeah. It really is baffling how people now want to get rid of it, or at least allow for more speed to “spice up the racing” when we all know it won’t. It will just marginally shift the balance of some decisions, but teams are still going to be reluctant to pit more than needed because passing is almost always harder than just staying in front with modern F1 cars.
HUHHII (@huhhii)
13th May 2025, 8:49
While Imola is far from my favorite tracks the fact that abysmal Miami has a deal until 2040’s and this being the last Imola race for a while shows everything what’s wrong in modern F1. Someone should pull the plug from this nonsense series and restart the whole thing from scratch.
Ankita
13th May 2025, 9:08
What’s wrong ?
uzsjgb (@uzsjgb)
13th May 2025, 9:16
I would guess “overtaking” is the thing wrong with F1. There is no overtaking in Imola, while there was a lot in Miami. If you grew up in a certain era, especially the years before DRS was introduced, overtaking in F1 would be an alien concept.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th May 2025, 9:24
@uzsjgb Miami is apt to be processional. If it weren’t for some people being out of place in qualifying (something that every circuit now manages), it would have been as lacking in overtaking as Japan 2025 and Monaco 2024.
(Also, overtaking was not only not an alien concept pre-DRS, but generally required more skill. Nowadays, it feels like most drivers give up if the DRS zone isn’t generous enough, to avoid the risk of their tyres falling off the cliff at the end of stints or their engine overheating and thus enforcing a slower mode).
Coventry Climax
13th May 2025, 22:36
What’s right?
AlexS
13th May 2025, 15:18
Imola is one of the few tracks i like to see an F1 car going do not even need racing.
Miami is a prison race track like all recent ones.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
14th May 2025, 0:25
I agree, a shame to lose a track like imola, where overtaking is difficult but not impossible; it had also been a very long time with no racing there, 15 years or so, so a good thing that came out of covid is that we got a few more races there, some interesting with rain too.
JMDan (@danmar)
14th May 2025, 20:49
Everyone wants to kiss the US backside.
bernasaurus (@bernasaurus)
13th May 2025, 9:05
Piratella, Acque Minerale, Rivazza
It’s one of those circuits that has names for corners and history, though I always found ‘Mineral Water’ being the name of a sequence of corners amusing as a kid. I do feel like F1 has outgrown Imola in a way. Don’t get me wrong I love the ‘Degners’, ‘Copses’, ‘Lesmos’ etc and everything attached to them and historic F1 tracks.
I prefer Imola to the modern street tracks, but it’s also very narrow. Fun to drive by yourself. But these big F1 cars look silly racing in a pack. Perhaps that isn’t Imola’s fault, more F1’s.
Jungle
13th May 2025, 9:17
Dingle Dell
Craig
13th May 2025, 15:50
Until there’s a desire to make F1 cars smaller I suspect this will continue to be a bigger and bigger problem. I wonder how Formula E cars might fare there as they’re probably a good size for the track (they work pretty well at Monaco, after all).
MichaelN
13th May 2025, 20:38
It’s definitely a car issue as well, but Imola also just has very short straights and rather slow corners. It’s always going to be hard to have much battling for position there.
It basically leaves driver mistakes as the big differentiator, and those are very rare in an era where they have to drive peculiar lines to maximize the underbody downforce and are also several seconds off their ultimate pace in an effort to preserve the bad tyres throughout a stint.
Yes (@come-on-kubica)
13th May 2025, 9:28
I adore Imola – the challenge of it, the way it moves and yet again it’s the track that’s the problem not these oversized overweight cars.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
13th May 2025, 11:27
It is sad to think that this is probably going to be the last F1 race at Imola. It has so much atmosphere and history, both good and bad. The truth is though it’s never been the best place for overtaking. It was bad back in the 1990s but with the size of the cars these days, overtaking is close to impossible. In this day and age that does seem to be a big downside.
Never mind though, we can look forward to some new street circuit or purpose built one in its place, with no atmosphere, history or even a local F1 following. As long as someone is prepared to pay a lot of money to host it. This is what happens when you put corporate greed before sport and history.
I know someone will disagree and complain about the sport always being money hungry but it’s what many fans think.
uzsjgb (@uzsjgb)
13th May 2025, 12:36
If you do like the sporting side of Formula 1, then you should really be glad that it is “money hungry”. We have seen the alternative for many years: pay drivers, teams repeatedly going bankrupt, many seconds between the slowest and fastest cars in the field.
I wonder why you like Formula 1 as a sport, even though you want Imola to stay, where “overtaking is close to impossible”. In my book cruising around single file for 90 minutes has little to do with sport. Why tune in, if you are interested in the sport and not – like many fans – in the crowds, the atmosphere, the hills or the trees?
I have been following Formula 1 since the 1980’s. As a sport it has never been in a better place. That is reflected by an ever growing fan base. I would say in part that is due to better racing and more competition. Racing in Miami is much better than at Imola, so it is only logical that Imola will be dropped and Miami extended. Yes, this will lose some fans, who do not primarily watch Formula 1 for the sport, but in exchange many more fans will be gained.
Alonslow
13th May 2025, 15:54
Maybe some of us likes permanent classic racing circuits, with grass, gravel, a interesting layout, elevation changes, beautiful scenery, history, and little overtaking is not a problem vs your DRS assisted “lots of overtaking” street circuit, not even on the actual city streets but in a permanent “street” circuit in a car parking lot full of walls everywhere.
I see the sport making more cash, I understand that, but F1 is increasingly going more and more to this street not actual streets circuits and throwing out the old and busted according to ‘actual fans of the sport’ classic circuit, look at Miami being renewed up to 2041 a 16 years extension, meanwhile tracks like Suzuka get a 5 year, a bit more historic ones like Silverstone can get a 10 year, but track made in a parking lot who has only been held 4 times? 16 years baby.
And even Europe is taking part in the fun of the parking lot street circuit, Madrid’s 9 year deal for a parking lot track full of walls, if we gonna have another street circuit can they at least make it take place in the actual city?, I don’t want to see a future when people celebrate that Silverstone is finally out of the calendar replaced by the new London parking lot street circuit.
Alonslow
13th May 2025, 16:11
Also you could make a good circuit in an actual parking lot space, it’s not impossible, tracks like Melbourne or Villeneuve are close to that, made in a park, Silverstone was an old military base pretty much the equivalent of big parking lot space, plenty of old classic tracks like Spa or Le mans started out as street circuits, you can make a good track in a parking lot it just seems to be a modern F1 mandate that they have 0% grass, gravel and 100% walls, tarmac and an awful chicane somewhere in the layout.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
13th May 2025, 19:36
Absolutely!
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
13th May 2025, 19:31
I would dispute that Formula 1 has never been in a better place. It’s doing OK this year and last. But it all depends on your opinion. Not everything is about pressing a button to overtake. Or even the actual need to do this which is ridiculous in itself. A race is not necessarily better with 50 overtakes compared to 10.
I have seen some great races where there has been a battle between two or three cars but it’s not easy to pass, and they have to figure their way to get by. This can be just as exciting. The Imola circuit is certainly a lot more interesting and more of a challenge than driving around the glorified car park that is Miami. The Miami race was not bad this year to be fair but I have a feeling we were lucky. Imola’s problem is it’s a bit too narrow. But the cars are too big and cumbersome. Most of the drivers say so.
Engagement and communication with fans is better now mainly due to the introduction of the internet and social media and the proliferation of communication channels. This has led to increase in the number of fans but this is not definitely driven by the quality of the racing. You seriously think it is better now than it was in the 1980s and 90s? I disagree.
It’s all very well singing the praises of somewhere like Miami but the older traditional circuits are being driven out. Why can’t they co-exist alongside the new ones? Imola, Zandvoort, Spa are all under threat and Monaco and Silverstone have been mentioned as well, longer term. To be replaced by what, places like Miami, Las Vegas, Jeddah, Losail. These are all getting long extensions because they are paying big bucks for it basically. Not because the racing is any good or the fans are always enthusiastic.
MichaelN
13th May 2025, 22:22
As sports entertainment, maybe. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
But it has no competition on tyres, it has frozen development on the engines, it has the most prescriptive regulations ever for the chassis, it even limits gearbox ratios for the entire season and has the supplier determine tyre pressures. Not infrequently race winning times are still slower than they were 20 years ago.
It’s actually surprising they manage to spend so much money on these cars given that they haven’t done anything noteworthy on the tech side since the early 1990s. The MGU-H is probably the only exception.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th May 2025, 9:33
@uzsjgb F1 was money-hungry back in the pay-driver days too. Some of the effects you describe were a result of that hunger. Endorsing the Miami known procession as somehow being different from a potential Imola procession does not help the argument you are attempting to advance.
(Also, an increasing amount of the fanbase deliberately do not watch any races, and only follow it for the drama and personalities. One of my relatives is among that number).
Jonathan Parkin
13th May 2025, 11:55
Whilst people like to say Imola was ruined by chicanes, they did also take two of them out. Acque Minerali had one that was called absurd by one motor racing journalist and after the Rubens Barrichello crash Variante Bassa became a kink
Jere (@jerejj)
13th May 2025, 12:54
All change at Alpine – The whole Team Enstone has been a mess for a while, but I’m fully positive Colapinto’s initial five-race stint will eventually turn into a full-time drive for the long term.
Arrivederci to Imola? – Indeed. Imola has been all but confirmed to end up out of next season’s GP calendar for some time, but what happens beyond next season is another matter, although even a possible 2027 or later return could realistically be for bi-annual hosting at the very maximum.
Extra-soft tyre arrives – I’m looking forward to seeing how the C6 will work on track, but it’ll indeed likely be avoided in the race, albeit this isn’t any different from the average, with teams more often than not covering race distances using the middle & hardest compound option for a given round.
Italy’s new F1 star – I’m positive he can change the trend & even though, he drives for Mercedes, he’ll probably still receive a warm welcome.
Ferrari’s woes – Hamilton will probably receive a warmer reaction than Antonelli, but I don’t have much hope for Ferrari’s chance in Imola either.
Verstappen and Piastri seek four in a row – Realistically, Piastri’s streak is more likely to continue based on recent form.
Pit safety – While I was aware that pit lane speed limit still wasn’t a thing in the early-1990s, I was unaware that a pit incident in, coincidentally, the 1994 San Marino GP led to its introduction in the first place.
Despite having 80 km/h as the pit lane speed limit, like for most circuits (all bar three presently), Imola indeed has the average longest overall pit stop time & I don’t think the sprint incident will reduce appetite for FIA’s consideration.
Besides, that incident would’ve happened even with 60 km/h as the limit, so nothing to do with this aspect & the mechanic amount is also a non-issue generally, not to mention pit lane incidents as a whole are rare, so clearly an isolated incident.
bernasaurus (@bernasaurus)
13th May 2025, 13:33
As crazy as 1994 was. That for so long F1 didn’t have a pit lane speed limit is the one I find the most baffling. And seemingly no limit on who could be in the pit lane. There’s hundreds if not thousands wandering about, half of them I’ve no idea why they’re there. We talk about ‘unsafe releases’ but in the early nighties drivers were throwing themselves into hoards of people.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
14th May 2025, 0:31
Yes, such a speed difference back in the 90s compared to now in the pit lane, they probably go 2,5-3x slower than they used to in there.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th May 2025, 9:35
@bernasaurus Basically in those days, if you had a garage pass, you had a pit lane pass – and to some extent it was possible to pay for extra passes. Neither was a thing after 1994, for obvious reasons.
Albo94
13th May 2025, 14:50
I don’t understand why Imola can’t revert to its pre-1995 layout, with proper barriers, if F1 is racing on a 200 mph street circuit (Jeddah).
AlexS
13th May 2025, 15:21
Indeed. But Jeddah pays $$$$$$
Jonathan Parkin
13th May 2025, 15:43
There is a river behind Tamburello which is why post 1994 it became a chicane instead. There was no room to expand the runoff on the outside of the corner
Albo94
13th May 2025, 15:55
With nowadays cars and tech-pro barriers, you could re-established the same layout with the same run-off. YEs, not ideal – but bearable.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
14th May 2025, 0:32
Absolutely true, safety has gone a looooong way since senna’s accident.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th May 2025, 9:36
Albo94, because Jeddah technically isn’t eligible for Grade 4 certification, and I guess Imola has some series that actually care about whether it complies with requirements rather than simply carries paperwork.
Albo94
15th May 2025, 7:11
I see your point, but they could just race on the current layout in the other series.
MaddSusie (@maddsusie)
13th May 2025, 16:10
I’ve never been a fan of Imola and have to agree with many others that I’d rather see Imola to the likes of Miami or any of the similar street circuits.
jpvalverde85 (@jpvalverde85)
13th May 2025, 23:26
Sad to see Imola going out being such historical circuit and having an Italian driver currently racing when in comparison we are having 2 dumpster in USA (Miami and Las Vegas, Austin is fine, the only proper circuit from the 3) and no drivers. Doesnt make any sense, even with Cadillac close to showing up, there is a pretty big list of cool circuits at USA, I would feel thrilled even for a Long Beach F1 race that is another street one.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
14th May 2025, 0:20
Extra soft?? I guess hyper soft wasn’t a good enough name? They used them at monaco some years ago.
Ferdi
15th May 2025, 7:23
Isn’t it time to all on this forum to start shouting the season is over, dominance bladibla… or are we only doing that when Verstappen wins and not when Oscar or Lando does it, similar as back in the days when Lewis won 200 races in a row?
Kevin C (@kev-f1)
15th May 2025, 9:44
What we need is a percentage of traditional F1 circuits that are present every year, Like Silverstone, Spa, Melbourne, Canada; Then a list of circuits that are on a rotation, Like Monaco, Turkey, Imola, and maybe a few other new circuits like an African continent race?
That way we have some variation and circuits don’t permanently disappear?
Chris C
15th May 2025, 12:39
If they want to improve pitlane safety they should start giving proper penalties for unsafe releases, instead of a few thousand euros in fines which an F1 team won’t even notice. No wonder these incidents are becoming ever more frequent.
Give them 10s added to their race time each time it happens. You will soon notice how much more careful they become!