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After a break of 26 days, Formula 1's frenetic 2024 season was back in full swing at the Dutch Grand Prix as the drivers and teams faced the media on Thursday for the first time since before the summer shutdown.
Here are five things we've learned from The Race's first day back in the paddock, from Zandvoort upgrades to the logic behind an eye-catching rule tweak.
Ricciardo admits he didn't do enough
Daniel Ricciardo knew leaving Spa before the summer break that there was a chance his next F1 race could be for Red Bull Racing rather than RB, but he admitted in the Zandvoort paddock that he knew he hadn't made an unanswerable case for promotion at Sergio Perez's expense and had "mentally prepared myself" for it not happening.
He summarised his position as "I thought maybe something could happen, but I also didn't expect it or get my hopes up". That was based on the fact that while his performance level was strong across the six race weekends leading up to the August break starting in Canada, it hadn't been across the whole season.
"It definitely helped, but I can't be like, 'this is enough guys, come on'," said Ricciardo when asked by The Race if he felt the run from Montreal onwards was enough to merit promotion. "I appreciate that it wasn't over the course of the first half of the season, it was more my performances got better in that last part. So it's definitely better, but I can't say this is definitely enough yet.
"I know that if I continue to do this over the course of the next few, then I could be like, "all right, this is the real me now, and I've proven it over a course of races'. Maybe it feels like it is [enough for promotion], maybe it doesn't. I'm happier, but I'm not going to make a song and dance and be like, 'I've been the best, do something about it'. I’ll just keep doing my thing."
Ricciardo therefore remains in a curious position, one where he could yet find his way into F1's championship-leading team for 2025 (and perhaps even earlier than that given the vagueness of Red Bull's Perez confirmation over the summer break), or be out of F1 entirely. With Helmut Marko indicating Liam Lawson will be in a race seat next year and Yuki Tsunoda already confirmed for RB, remaining where he is might actually be the least-likely possibility for Ricciardo.
Not that he's letting that get to him, instead focusing on what a driver should do in that situation: performing. He also didn't fall into the trap some drivers might of taking it out on his possible replacement.
"It's OK," he said when asked about the impact of Lawson's likely F1 seat on his mindset. "I still know that performance is my best friend and if I do what I know I can do, [what I] am capable of, then it puts me in a very good position to obviously stay somewhere in the family for next year. So I've just got to focus on that.
"Speaking on Liam, I got to see him drive the car last year and I do think he did a great job. I do think he is worthy of a seat on the grid. In a way I'm happy for him, if he is guaranteed a seat next year, then I think that's good because he is a deserving driver.
"So then what that means for me? As I said, probably a little bit unknown but if I perform then I'm sure they'll find a spot for me somewhere."
Ricciardo also emphasised he is not looking elsewhere, taking what he calls an "all-in approach" in terms of convincing Red Bull he's worth on keeping on.
"Red Bull has given me the opportunity to be back here, so it's not something I just want to dismiss and be, 'Ok what’s the next thing?'. There is no next thing for me, this is it. I'm appreciative of what they've been able to give me now and I really just want to try and make it work with them." - Edd Straw
Norris's specific weakness
Lando Norris returns to F1 action determined to force himself into title contention. But as he admits, there have been "just one, two many mistakes, a few too many points given away, which is not the level I want to be at if I want to be fighting for a championship".
Norris cited race starts as a key area for improvement. Across the 17 races (including sprints) so far this season, he has lost a combined total of 15 places on first laps, six times finishing the first lap lower than he started it.
"It's a mixture of things, but starts and lap one," said Norris when asked what areas he's targeting for improvement. "Not a [one] single thing I need to change honestly, but that's where most of my opportunities have gone away from me. After lap one, generally the races have been very strong and the pace has still been very good. Race pace has been good, strategy I've been very happy with.
"Still so many strong things but always overshadowed by a bad start or Turn 1 or being a bit safe sometimes, trying to stay out of trouble.”
Norris has also made plenty of perfectly good starts, finishing the opening lap where he started on 11 occasions - albeit without ever having improved his position. As he alludes to, the desire to keep out of trouble at the start at Spa was costly as it dropped him from fourth to seventh. As he says, there’s no specific pattern to what's going wrong but he and McLaren will have studied the causes very closely in case there are easy ways to make improvements.
The key for Norris will be striking the right balance between recognising and tackling problems, and avoiding overthinking it. That's all part of the learning curve for a driver who is battling to get to grips with being a regular at the front of the field.
"Over the first half of this season, I've not performed at the level of a world champion, simple as that," said Norris. "At certain times I have, many races I have done, but some little things have let me down along the way.
"As I've shown in the last few races, I've not been happy when I've not been at the level I need to be at. That's because I'm passionate and I want to win. Finding that line of not judging a driver for being passionate and wanting to win and not being happy with not winning. That's what athletes do and that's what we want." - ES
Braking controversy red herring
A big talking point late on in the summer break concerned a regulation update relating to braking systems, emphatically forbidding any system or mechanism that produces asymmetric braking torques for a given axle.
Such a system would mean different braking forces on the inside or outside wheel and be a big help for rotating these inherently understeery ground-effect cars. The Race understands the idea had been discussed previously and determined to be illegal if used, but the rules didn't explicitly outlaw it.
Inevitably, the emergence of a new regulation around this sparked theories that one or more teams may have been deploying such a system. Maybe banning the use of that was behind Red Bull's in-season struggles? But The Race understands this is not the case.
And Max Verstappen was crystal clear when asked if this rule tweak will affect the performance of the Red Bull: "Not at all, no."
While it is possible, even likely, that teams were interested in doing this, there is no belief within the governing body that such a system was being used because it would be considered illegal even without this specific clarification - which was based on a discussion around the regulation wording for the 2026 rules.
It was deemed wise to implement it immediately for the existing regulations as well, for the sake of clarity and consistency. - Scott Mitchell-Malm
Significant upgrades are here (and some aren't)
A batch of new upgrades is almost inevitable after any summer break but there are particular nuisances around some of them - and a telling absence of others - that make the tech developments at Zandvoort highly significant.
McLaren has what Norris describes as its first proper upgrade since the Miami GP upgrade in May that transformed it from podium challenger to championship contender.
Norris says McLaren has "paid the price" for not introducing an upgrade sooner while rivals have, but praised the cautious approach the team is taking to ensure it doesn't run into the troubleshooting issues that other teams such as Red Bull have when debuting an upgrade.
Perez says Red Bull understands the RB20 much better after the summer break but there won't be an immediate upgrade at Zandvoort.
That's the case too for Ferrari, which is looking to get its season back on track, having been demoted to having the fourth-fastest car in the last few races before the summer break.
The team claims to have a better understanding of the bouncing problems that hurt its 2024 season but a major upgrade to boost its peak performance won't come any sooner than its home race at Monza.
Mercedes will run the new floor that it dropped from its cars after Friday at the Belgian Grand Prix. It will start with a back-to-back test in FP1 with George Russell running the new floor and Lewis Hamilton the old.
Behind the top four teams, Williams has a major upgrade - the first significant upgrade package of its 2024 season.
It brought a new front wing to Suzuka but almost every other update has been all about tackling the FW46's weight.
The Zandvoort package is the first of a two-step upgrade. Alex Albon described this weekend's upgrade as all about adding more load to the car, while the second - which could come around Baku/Singapore time in mid-September - will aim to improve the balance.
Williams is hoping for a big step as while a spate of early-season crashes put it in a precarious spare parts position, aerodynamic work has continued to rumble on in the background. Williams chief engineer Dave Robson insisted that the team's "windtunnel and simulator progress has been able to work largely unhindered and just deliver some bigger steps".
Williams has the same specification of floor as in Bahrain (it did bring a lighter version to Imola), highlighting how little the profile of the FW46 has changed until Zandvoort. - Josh Suttill
Why Piastri had to do multiple races with a broken rib
Oscar Piastri signed off for F1's recent summer break with a tweet about taking his first grand prix victory while driving with a broken rib.
First part of the season done.
— Oscar Piastri (@OscarPiastri) August 11, 2024
First GP victory.
First broken bone.
Rib’s enjoying the break 💪 pic.twitter.com/xee5myxNTP
Naturally, upon his return he was immediately asked questions about how that broken rib came to be, and whether it's now completely healed.
He revealed to media in the Zandvoort paddock that his broken rib was confirmed by a scan "the day after Silverstone" but that the rib was "definitely broken" before the British GP in early July and that he did "three" races with it in that state.
"It was some point around Austria," he said of the injury. "I think it was probably a bit disturbed in Barcelona and then in Austria afterwards it was pretty painful - and Silverstone was a pretty nasty few days...but we made some changes and it was already getting better even with driving around Budapest and Spa. It's all back to normal now."
Piastri joked McLaren has added so much downforce to its 2024 car that his rib simply couldn't take the strain, while explaining that he got injured "just from driving".
F1 drivers are of course subjected to incredible G-forces, but it's not that Piastri's rib cage is especially weak or his core muscles lacking in strength.
It turns out the seat McLaren made for him at the start of the year was "a little bit wrong" and began placing undue stress on his body.
"Some tracks don't expose it, but going from Barcelona, Austria to Silverstone - three pretty hardcore tracks - just a bit of a pressure point which eventually my rib gave up," said Piastri, who explained the seat had now been changed and the problem fixed. - Ben Anderson
