Three F1 drivers on borrowed time… and the 2025 contenders to replace them

The 2024 Formula 1 season is only four rounds down, but there are already signs that some in the class of ’24 won’t be around for 2025.

While the 20 drivers entering the curtain-opening Bahrain race were the same that drove in last year’s Abu Dhabi finale, that will not be the case again next season.

READ MORE: Hamilton has timed his F1 Ferrari switch to perfection

Contracts ending, poor performances, and hotshot junior drivers are setting up F1’s annual game of musical chairs to be one for the ages.

We know Lewis Hamilton will switch to Ferrari and that Carlos Sainz is the sport’s most eligible bachelor, but how about those who must literally drive to survive in 2024 and haven’t yet shown the goods?

Here are the drivers facing a short-term F1 future and those in the frame to replace them.

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The honey badger’s triumphant return to the sport in 2023 was short-lived after he sustained an injury over the Dutch Grand Prix weekend.

Many thought Ricciardo could face the chop for 2024 after Liam Lawson parachuted in and immediately impressed AlphaTauri without any F1 experience.

Yet Ricciardo was the Faenza team’s Australasian driver of choice but is now underperforming next to Yuki Tsunoda, with the Japanese racer outqualifying him at all four races this season and the Aussie not scoring any of RB’s seven points.

It’s not a good look for a race-winning driver at a team meant to nurture talent to lose against someone without a podium 176 races his junior.

With Ricciardo and Tsunoda under the microscope in late 2023, Lawson looked the chief contender to replace one of the RB drivers before the 2024 season began.

However, this year’s first four races have changed the complexion of RB’s 2025 line-up storyline to become “Who will be Tsunoda’s teammate” instead.

With Isack Hadjar, one of Helmut Marko’s favourite juniors, also recently finding form in F2 and Ayumu Iwasa joining RB for FP1 in Japan, there’s not a shortage of possible replacements should the Lawson option not work out for any reason.

Ricciardo’s F1 days are numbered unless he turns his season around soon.

READ MORE: Mercedes F1 boss makes shock U-TURN on key decision

Like Ricciardo, Kevin Magnussen was a driver left in the motorsport wilderness before surprisingly coming back to be the safe pair of hands at the expense of a more inexperienced racer.

Having first joined Haas in 2017, the Danish driver is a long-time part of the American team’s furniture, but Haas is no longer under Guenther Steiner’s stewardship, the man who twice brought Magnussen in.

Suggestions that Ollie Bearman was to advance into F1 for 2025 started with the announcement that the Ferrari Driver Academy ace would participate in six FP1 sessions over the season.

That’s an unprecedented move. With so few hours to hone car setup in any race weekend, there’s…