Spanish GP - Five things to look out for in Barcelona

The European leg of the F1 season is almost upon us. While we can’t wait for the European leg to begin, it is quite a nervous time for the teams as it is the time when most teams traditionally bring major updates to their cars.

Here are a list of five things to look out for:

1) The pecking order: With most of the teams bringing major update packages, the first and foremost thing to look out for is to see whether any team has managed to sneak ahead in the development race. Apart from the huge battle going on at the front between the big teams like Red Bull, Lotus, Ferrari and Mercedes, there is an interesting midfield battle brewing. Force India have started the season very strongly and Barcelona will reveal whether the midfield teams can stage a fightback.

2) The Pirelli effect: After a lot of behind the scenes lobbying, Pirelli have changed the structure of their hard tire. It remains to be seen what effect this has on the grid. Although one would suspect that teams which are good on hard tires such as Red Bull might gain an advantage and teams such as Lotus which have very low degradation and run strongly on soft tires might lose out.

3) The resurgence experts: McLaren have traditionally been one of the teams that can develop their cars the best. The team are under intense pressure and Jonathan Neale has confirmed that they are bringing a substantial amount of updates. Will this be enough to propel the team to the sharp end of the grid?

4) The Silver Arrows: Mercedes have started the season strongly. But their critics are arguing that they did the same last year before petering out. Now after they have publicly announced that they’re moving half their workforce to work on their 2014 challenger, there’s even more pressure on them to perform.

5) Team-mate wars and possible sackings: A team-mate is the first person against whom you are measured after a race. That’s because both the drivers drive the same car. There are a couple of very interesting intra-team battles going on. After his aggressive race at Bahrain, Sergio Perez has thrown out a challenge to Button and it will be interesting to see how he responds. After the Multi-21 fiasco, another noteworthy thing to look out for is what happens when a similar situation occurs. Will the two Red Bull drivers obey team orders or will they take it upon themselves to drive for glory. There are also interesting battles brewing over at Lotus, Mercedes and Force India. Also, with rookie Esteban Gutierrez not performing up to the mark, it will be interesting to see whether he will be replaced during the season. Also, Caterham who are under a lot of pressure from Marussia might be temped to draft ex-driver Heikki Kovalainen back into their car.

The European phase of the season is always an exciting leg especially with crowd favourite races like Canada and the F1 crown jewel Monaco. But with many sub-plots to look through, there will be added excitement for sure.