What our writers are looking forward to at the F1 Belgian GP

Formula 1 has just enjoyed its longest break between races since the season started in 2025 – an entire two weekends without racing – but so much has happened after the paddock packed up and went home from Silverstone.

From Christian Horner’s axing at Red Bull to the title fight hotting up at the start of the second half of the season, here’s what we’re looking forward to ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix.

Red Bull’s fresh start as Verstappen future remains unclear – Filip Cleeren

Unless you have lived under a rock over the past few weeks – if you’ve spent your summer holidays on a remote tropical island, we can’t blame you – a seismic shift at Red Bull has dominated the F1 news agenda. For the first time in its 20-year existence the squad heads to a race without being spearheaded by Christian Horner, who has been dumped days after the British Grand Prix.

Horner’s exit is the endgame of a long power struggle within Red Bull, coinciding with the team’s gradual slide in performance. The exact trigger for Red Bull giving Horner the boot is still not entirely clear, but it is obvious what is at stake as Max Verstappen’s camp has been having talks with Mercedes as it mulls over the Dutchman’s long-term future, whether for 2026 or 2027.

Former FIA and Ferrari man Laurent Mekies has been picked as Horner’s successor, and the 48-year-old Frenchman will address the media in Friday’s FIA press conference for the first time as he sets out his vision for how to get the best out of the team that dominated as recently as 2023. Having inherited a strong squad, but one that has also seen several stalwarts like Adrian Newey leave, Mekies will have to convince Verstappen he is the right man to ensure Red Bull can remain a title protagonist in the near future.

Will Red Bull revolution impact Mercedes’ driver dilemma? – Haydn Cobb

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, George Russell, Mercedes, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images via Getty Images

Last month Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said the team’s driver line-up for 2026 will be decided in the F1 summer break, while flirtations with Max Verstappen continued to deepen. In the aftermath of Christian Horner’s Red Bull exit, the four-time world champion’s future has been debated with even greater intensity – fuelled by reports of two yachts, one owned by Wolff and the other by Verstappen, floating in close proximity off the Sardinian coast.

While Wolff has moved to play down speculation, Verstappen’s future and the impact it will have on current Mercedes drivers George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli will remain front and centre in focus until the German manufacturer commits to a driver line-up for next season.

“The direction of travel is definitely that we want to continue with George and Kimi,” Wolff told Austrian broadcaster ORF this week. “That is the absolute priority. But you can’t look past someone like Max and the plans he has for the future. We did that, but I don’t think there will be any big surprises.”

So, with Horner gone, Wolff playing it down and the 2026 rules reset providing the biggest unknown, will Verstappen commit to sticking or twisting, at least for another year, at Spa?

McLaren title fight intensifies – Filip Cleeren

Lando Norris, McLaren, Oscar Piastri, McLaren

Photo by: Erik Junius

At one stage Oscar Piastri looked like having the upper hand on Lando Norris in the intra-team fight for the world championship. But as Norris is getting more comfortable with his 2025 car in qualifying, two wins on the trot have brought the Briton right back in the game, trailing his McLaren team-mate by just eight points at the halfway mark.

In Silverstone Piastri was particularly aggrieved by receiving the 10-second time penalty that cost him the British Grand Prix win to Norris. A frustrated Australian vowed to channel his unprecedented display of rage into even better performances, and it will be intriguing to see if he can strike back in Spa to restore his title bid momentum.

Last year Norris edged Piastri by a mere 0.046s in a wet qualifying session, but it was Piastri who finished ahead in the race, classified in second behind Lewis Hamilton, who took the win after Mercedes colleague George Russell was disqualified. Will Norris and Piastri resume their battles from Canada and Austria once more? At a fast and flowing circuit like Spa-Francorchamps, that could be box office.

Can Ferrari finally build momentum? – Owen Bellwood

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari

Photo by: Erik Junius

Ferrari came into the 2025 season full of optimism. It had invested heavily in upgrading its car compared with last year’s racer and boasted a new driver in the form of seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton.

When lights went out in Australia, however, the results did not quite match the hype, and Ferrari has failed to meet those lofty expectations ever since – despite upgrades rolling out to address various issues with the SF-25. There was a whisper of hope in Austria, where the Scuderia ran a new floor that heralded a slight bump in performance, and at Spa the team will bring another upgrade in the form of a new rear suspension set-up, which was trialled at a filming day in Italy last week.

The combined package of the new floor and the updated suspension is thought to offer as much as a tenth of a second in performance gains for Ferrari, which could be just enough to improve the mood of Hamilton and team-mate Charles Leclerc. Equally, though, the update could be something of a last hurrah for Ferrari before it completely gives up on the SF-25 and switches its attention to F1’s new regulations, coming in 2026. As such, Spa and the Hungarian Grand Prix, which follows a week later, could prove pivotal for the Scuderia’s season.

Sprint race success may decide who becomes F1 world champion in 2025 – Ed Hardy

Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari

Photo by: Bryn Lennon – Formula 1

Let’s face it, not many of us like a Formula 1 sprint weekend. It is a dull, manufactured way of creating more entertainment, only that it fails in doing so with the shortened race often being a processional affair that drivers care little about. Just ask Max Verstappen, who once said he receives “no satisfaction” from a sprint victory.

That came at a time when the world champion was dominating though, so there wasn’t much on the line in the Saturday contest. But this year, a sprint race does matter – more than ever in fact.

Just look at the title picture: Oscar Piastri leads McLaren team-mate Lando Norris by eight points. The same amount of points given for a sprint win. So what if this weekend Norris wins the sprint, while a mechanical issue hits Piastri and he’s forced to retire? Both drivers are then tied on points but with Norris in the ascendency, having continued his recent momentum after winning the previous two grands prix. Or it could go the other way, with Piastri putting a much-needed halt into Norris’ rise.

The margins are fine either way, so sprint races may decide who wins the 2025 F1 championship. For that reason alone, it’s time to really pay attention to them because sprint races are now a very crucial part of this intriguing title battle.