Lewis Hamilton has been included at Mercedes in Formula 1’s provisional entry list for 2021, as published by Motorsport Week.
Publicly at least, the seven-time world champion is yet to commit his future to the German manufacturer beyond this year, though it is considered a matter of ‘when’ not ‘if’ he will.
Still, George Russell’s impressive stand-in performance last weekend in Bahrain has raised some new questions over the future Mercedes line-up, predominantly around Valtteri Bottas.
Something team boss Toto Wolff was quick to erase in Abu Dhabi.
“He’s going to be in our car, I am hereby confirming it,” the Austrian declared via Crash.net. “We have a contract with Valtteri and he is going to race next year. You need to kick me quite hard in a sensitive zone for me to ever lose my loyalty.
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“I am loyal to my two race drivers in the same way I am loyal to our junior drivers. George did a phenomenal job last weekend and he deserves to be in a great car one day.
“He has a contract with Williams for one more year and they have been very flexible and accommodating in giving George to Mercedes this other weekend. Everything is going to go its way, but calmly and in a structured way.”
Elsewhere, only two seats are labelled TBC, one at Red Bull and another at AlphaTauri.
Alex Albon is still expected to be retained alongside Max Verstappen despite interest in Sergio Perez, while Yuki Tsunoda is all-but-confirmed as Daniil Kvyat’s replacement at the sister squad.
Name changes for Renault (Alpine) and Racing Point (Aston Martin) are also included, as is McLaren’s switch to Mercedes engines from Renault.
Sebastian Vettel (Aston Martin), Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) and Daniel Ricciardo (McLaren) are placed at their new teams, while Fernando Alonso returns to the list at Alpine.
Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin will be the other rookies on the grid at Haas (if Tsunoda is confirmed), with No.47 announced for the German and No.9, formerly raced by Marcus Ericsson, for the Russian.
The full provisional entry list can be seen below:
