25th August 2006: What Is Drawing Teams To Younger Competitors?

A lot of older journalists or fans might start to feel their age after witnessing the news of these young drivers being brought into the sport, especially considering this age gap between the Spaniard and the 2025 rookies. Although it seems like a crazy idea to introduce someone like Kimi who is newly 18 into one of the most challenging motorsport series in the world, it's not the first time that a dominant team, like Mercedes, have taken this sort of step. If you cast your mind back not too far into 2015, you can't forget the day that 3-time world champion, Max Verstappen became the youngest ever person to start a Formula One race and still holds onto this record to date. But even before then during the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix, he drove in practice sessions just 3 days after his 17th birthday to prepare him for this career-changing role at the Toro Rosso team.

The FIA wailed as they usually do after such an insane decision, ultimately restricting super-licenses as a knee-jerk reaction. However the complaints that it would be dangerous for someone of such a young age to join the pinnacle of motorsport hadn't even lasted 10 years until the regulation was appealed earlier this year as if 'in favour' for the young Italian's arrival by gradually reducing the age to 17 years old. That was if they ^"consistently demonstrated outstanding ability and maturity in single-seater formula car competition" (fia.com), albeit the statement is arguably based on opinion. Whether or not you believe Kimi Antonelli ticks these boxes, his first session in a Formula One car came 5 days after his 18th birthday but came to an abrupt end in the barrier at Parabolica when tuning up in his second run. It's almost as if the FIA want to be back in the situation that they were facing a decade earlier in order to change the face of racing in Formula One forever.

A cultural shift has definitely occurred during the 21st century regarding the age of Formula One drivers. I'm sure that in the 50s or 60s, 5 rookies (if you want to count Liam Lawson and Franco Colapinto for the remainder of the 2024 season) all under 22 years of age would have been unheard of. Particularly since the youngest driver to even win a grand prix in the 1950s was Bruce McLaren at 22 years old and 106 days; a record that has since been squashed many times the further that you head into recent history with Fernando Alonso at 22 years and 26 days in 2003 and Sebastian Vettel at 21 years and 73 days in 2008. It's even quoted on the Formula One official website that "between 1960 and 1993, the average age for an F1 driver hovered at around 32, although Jack Brabham and Graham Hill both won their races in their forties" (formula1.com).

Yet in a newer age of Formula One, there could be a competitive advantage to having less digits in your age, mostly involving physical fitness and quick reflexes. This isn't to say older drivers don't hold what seems like a godly amount of strength. I mean, fans are often 'gifted' the odd Instagram story of the likes of Lewis Hamilton or Fernando Alonso in training on a bike or at the gym. But as mentioned quick reflexes definitely hold host to a critical aspect of high-speed racing, especially in terms of intense split-second decisions that draw in through an instant on a race weekend.

Quicker reactions = less accidents = less money to reconstruct cars = happier teams and mechanics, but not always a guarantee with age as represented by Mick Schumacher and Nicholas Latifi who both built up hefty bills during their stints in the sport.

Technology would also play into the hands of younger drivers. The likes of Franco Colapinto, Liam Lawson and probably many more would have trained on a simulator as well as every driver on the grid that continues to do so.

As the technical age began to take off, drivers of the 2000s wouldn't have had access to these fancy new machines and rather focus on general strength and coordination training; and for much less time as a 20 year evolution has shown that drivers will train for 8 hours a day or more instead of the 6 hours at a time in the case of Michael Schumacher for 6 days a week. Gone are the days of copying your teammate's settings on the car to get a better result too when you consider one of the most famous duos in the 1980s (hint: their names both begin with 'A'). You're on your own if you want to win and that means putting in the hours of hard training, physical or technological.

Yet this isn't an article to say that Alonso or Hamilton for that matter should be exiting the sport immediately to make room. As much as older drivers being successful isn't common, it's certainly not impossible especially if you look at the colourful burst of the current Spaniard's podium positions at the start of 2023 which some believed could have the capacity to change the championship in the long term, and still believe it could with the arrival of Adrian Newey into the Silverstone-based team for 2025 and beyond.

At the end of the day, that driver who won the first championship of a budding new league in motorsport still sits at 2nd in the all-time list of oldest world champions, otherwise famously known as Giuseppe Farina in 1950. While he sat at 43 years and 308 days, Juan Manuel Fangio beat his record 7 years later at an incredible 46 years and 41 days and even Lewis Hamilton sits on this top 10 list from his 2020 performance during the limited calendar. But as always it's vital to consider what type of cars were being driven in the 50s compared to the complex gadgets that are raced around today.

It's safe to say that the FIA aren't discouraging the arrival of younger talent as of November 2024. The regulations now state that teams have to dedicate 2 practice sessions a year to a rookie driver whether this be F2 or rookie reserve, in the case of Felipe Drugovich for Aston Martin which occurred just a few weeks ago for the Mexican GP. This allowance should improve the flow of newer drivers making their way into the sport and adding a variety that is forever needed in a competitive sport to provide exciting racing. Even more so during the last few years with the arrival of, to put it plainly, 'iconic trios'. But this isn't to say that Fernando Alonso or Nico Hulkenberg shouldn't watch out for the kids and rather should hold onto the everlasting probability that they could outlive you in the harsh world of motorsport.