The only driver who defeated the cars of Red Bull Racing In the last 500 days it is the most coveted piece in the transfer market of the Formula 1. Only eight seats are guaranteed for the 2025 grid and The figure of Carlos Sainz Jr. appears in the talks of several of the eight teams that will have to rebuild their ranks for the next calendar. Only Ferrari and McLaren have confirmed their driver pairings for the next season: the Monegasque Charles Leclerc and the British Lewis Hamilton, in the Scuderia; Lando Norris and Óscar Piastri, at the Woking factory. The hiring of the seven-time world champion, with a multi-year contract, meant the closing of Sainz Jr.’s cycle in Maranello, although the Spaniard offers performances of excellence that spark a bid to have his services: Mercedes began talks with its representatives and Red Bull Racing, which trained him in its academy and used him in Toro Rosso, along with Max Verstappen, in 2015, analyzes the scenario and the relationships to negotiate and relaunch a formula that showed failures in the past.
“I think everyone knows what Carlos is worth and that is why I said many times that I am not too worried about his future, because I am sure that many, many team directors are following him. He doesn’t say it, but they’re probably already talking to him. He is one of the drivers best considered by the paddock and he is extremely strong for developments”, Leclerc’s praise for his teammate at Ferrari and with whom he has shared a garage since 2021. The Monegasque surpasses him in statistics: he doubles him in classification -46 to 23-, although the margin is reduced in grand prix, with a 39 to 29 and a abandonment of both in the 2022 Azerbaijan GP. But it is Sainz Jr. who with the victories in Singapore 2023 and Australia 2024 was among the 30 successes of the Milton Keynes carsbetween grand prizes and Sprint.
“It was not the easiest call of my life,” admitted Frederic Vasseur, the Ferrari team boss, about the decision to inform the Spaniard that he will not continue in 2025. The challenge of facing a season without a guaranteed seat for the next calendar He pushed Sainz Jr. to the limit and The epic surrounded him with the victory in Albert Park, two weeks after he was absent from the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix due to a medical emergency that led to surgery for appendicitis.. Until hitting the track in Melbourne, Sainz Jr. was not sure he had the energy and strength necessary to retrace the weekend. “Between cotton. He was strong in training and qualifying, but A race has a greater physical and psychological strain: from concentration to resistance”said his father, Carlos, four-time winner of the Dakar Rally and two-time World Rally champion.
Ferrari offers itself as the best platform to demonstrate its value. Team driver, car developer – a task that he also tried at McLaren between 2019 and 2020, alongside Norris – the triumphs that were seen as a lack now strengthen the driver who will have a wide spectrum of offers to start a second decade in the F.1. Toto Wolff, the leader of Mercedes, maintained contacts with the Spaniard’s entourage: the Austrian met in Jedá with Carlos Oroño – the driver’s agent – and Carlos Sr. “Those that are available or that could be interesting for us have arguments in their favor. Whether they are the very young, the very mature in their best years or Carlos” Wolff noted. The reference trilogy pointed to the Italian promise Andrea Kimi Antonelli – linked to Mercedes since 2019 -; Fernando Alonso, who will end his relationship with Aston Martin and Sainz Jr at the end of the year. The greatest wish is Max Verstappen, but the Dutchman is an element with a contract until 2028 with Red Bull Racing and although turbulence surrounds the Milton Keynes team The performances of the three-time world champion continue to reflect that the RB20 is the best car on the grid, the one that leads the way, the one that everyone wants to beat and with which he can add a fourth and even fifth crown in the Great Circus. “I want to continue monitoring the market. It will depend on what Max does: today we are the only top team with a free seat“, expressed Toto, who let escape MadMax at the time and if he is released he does not want to repeat the mistake, although he does not take his eye off Sainz Jr.
Replacing the Spaniard could be a move by Red Bull Racing, if Verstappen decides to blow up the market or if the team abandons renewing the contract. Czech Pérez. “He is without a doubt a great pilot. He was almost on par with Max, the bad thing for him is that he was unlucky to have Verstappen as a teammate“, recognized Helmut Marko, the sports advisor of the Milton Keynes team, about the virtues of Sainz Jr. The name of the Madrid native was related to the team not only in the days when he was an academy driver and when he formed a partnership with MadMax in Toro Rosso for 23 grand prix, between 2015 and 2016: with the Dutchman established as the first sword and before the departure of Daniel Ricciardo to Renault, the possibility of recruiting him remained a simple hypothesis and Marko was the one who collapsed the theory. “The atmosphere between the two when they were at Toro Rosso was somewhat toxic.”. On the one hand, there was the intelligent and political Carlos Sainz Sr. and on the other the temperamental Jos Verstappen, that was not a healthy relationship either,” added the Austrian.
Sainz Jr. and Verstappen were aware that only one seat was available in the elite team and the battle was fierce in Toro Rosso. “They put us in a cage to fight. It was a development team to evaluate drivers to see if they are ready to join Red Bull Racing.. It was a constant test, the atmosphere was very competitive, but we still got along well. I think I did more than just survive as a teammate in 2015 and it was very important in my career,” the Spaniard said a few years ago about that experience and the ruthless rivalry that was established in the Milton Keynes structure from the young talent program. The signs of combativeness in passages were heightened, as in the Singapore GP: “Max likes a bit of the bad boy role and I knew it, but now he showed it,” commented Sainz Jr., after the Dutchman’s disobedience to a team order. Three races earlier, the Spaniard had given up his position so that his compatriot Fernando Alonso could not catch up with Verstappen.
“He is the only driver who beat Red Bull, he seems to be our nemesis“, Horner said, about Sainz Jr. “We want to form the best couple and sometimes you also have to look outside the pool. In Australia, a fast driver won and he will be without a seat, so no possibility can be ruled out. We have to take our time, we are not desperate,” commented the Briton, who after the conflict that broke out due to alleged harassment of an employee – a situation that was investigated by the team and was dismissed – wants to regain full control with his decisions, those that brought glory back to the cars of Milton Keynes. Adding who for now is the jewel of the market, an ambitious action but one that could also revive that friendly fire from a decade ago.