Jacques Villeneuve has made some predictions for the 2025 F1 season. On the menu, potential surprises, future disappointments, and possible drivers who could lose their steering wheel during the year or at the end of the season.
“Who will surprise us in 2025? I'm curious to see Sainz at Williams. His first tests were impressive because the car was going faster than it had gone before” Villeneuve told The Action Network.
“And he's generally been a team builder everywhere he's been. So, on a team that really needs one, let's see how it goes. It could be an extraordinary step forward that would be the biggest surprise of the year.”
“I would say Aston Martin will be the biggest disappointment of 2025, not because they will do a bad job, but because people expect them to start winning with Adrian Newey. But he won't hasn't had time to have an effect on the team yet.”
“Expectations from outsiders and fans will be misplaced. The results will be disappointing, not because they will be bad, but because they will not be what people want and hope to see with Newey. It takes time.”
“Tsunoda will be the first driver off the grid. He is only here because of Honda. At some point, this will stop. And the writing is pretty clear that this is his last season with the Red Bull family anyway. And I don't see any team wanting him unless there's a big push from Honda.”
The Canadian gave his opinion on what awaits Liam Lawson at Red Bull alongside Max Verstappen: “It's a great chance for Liam Lawson, it's a great opportunity, but we've seen drivers integrated into the main team fall apart very quickly before.
“So we will see if he is mentally strong and if he is really good, because we don't know yet. I mean you can't take his F2 season, his Japanese season or his races against Tsunoda as reference.”
“Contractually, Lawson is there to help Verstappen. But in his head, he is not. In his head, he is there to replace Max. So, he will try to be hard and fast. I hope that will put Max under pressure and push him to drive even better. This way the team progresses.”
-The New Zealander's objectives will be simple, according to him: “If it's not a winning car it would be second or nothing, and if they don't win the championship then a good finish for Lawson would be one place behind Verstappen or two places behind him, that's it.
If you win races, you have a big points tally. Because from first to second place, it's a big difference. If you finish third, fourth, fifth, the difference in points is tiny.”
The 1997 world champion doesn't know what to expect from rookie drivers, especially because of F2: “No idea what to expect from [Gabriel] Bortoleto. No idea. Formula 2 has never been a good judge of drivers. So it's useless until they get to F1. But at the moment they come to F1 with so little experience.”
“It's very difficult to understand how you can get to the highest level of the biggest sport in the world so quickly, at such a young age and with so little experience. I find it quite surprising. They work a lot in simulators, which which allows them to be fast, but we also see what happened with Antonelli at Monza.”
On the other hand, Villeneuve is not impressed by Franco Colapinto and his accidents: “Franco Colapinto wasted his chances. If you're given a golden chance, it's up to you to make the most of it. He can't cry over his fate.”
“He got a few races out of it in F1, which is not given to everyone. It's not given to everyone, so it's already impressive that he had this chance. I don't know not what will happen to his future. He remains a fast driver. But what he showed is that he didn't assess the situation well.
