'It's causing me a bit of stress' admits Sainz on his looming 2025 decision

Carlos Sainz has acknowledged that the ongoing deliberation over his F1 future for 2025 is proving to be stressful, with the Spaniard saying that his days between races currently involve “a lot of talks and conversations”.

Speculation over where Sainz will race next season has been persistent in recent months, following the announcement back in February that he will leave Ferrari after the team opted to sign Lewis Hamilton on a multi-year contract.

READ MORE: Russell hails 2024 season as ‘one of the best I’ve ever had’ as he assesses prospect of Sainz as Mercedes team mate

Since then Sainz has been linked to a number of teams, including Alpine, Williams and Kick Sauber, while the possibility of a move to Mercedes does not appear to have been completely ruled out.

Asked ahead of this weekend’s British Grand Prix if the decision is causing him stress – or is in fact a positive situation to be in – Sainz admitted: “No, for sure it’s causing me a bit of stress and time to think.

“Especially because, obviously, Mondays to Thursdays a lot of things are happening behind closed doors. There's a lot of talks and a lot of conversations going on, then once I arrive on Thursday to the track all this disappears and I'm focusing 100% on performing in Ferrari.

“I think Austria proves that I'm able to split the two things pretty well. But for sure Mondays to Thursdays I'm more busy and more stressed than what I was in a normal year.”

THE STRATEGIST: How Sainz could have beaten Piastri to P2 in Austria

Austria was indeed a successful weekend for Sainz, with the 29-year-old scoring a podium in third place after the late-race collision between leaders Max Verstappen and Lando Norris caused the former to drop down to fifth and the latter to retire with damage to his car.

While Sainz would like to return to being in that fight himself – as he has been in the past, having last claimed victory at the third race of the season in Australia – he is hopeful that he can avoid the consequences that occurred for Verstappen and Norris in Spielberg.

“I think that’s the beauty of the sport,” Sainz said of seeing the battle unfold ahead of him. “We were there for a couple of races this year and I enjoyed [that] a lot.

“You expose yourself to being in these kinds of incidents and being [in] the media spotlight and having all these consequences and these fights for the win. But I’d rather be in their position than in mine, so I think they’re lucky to be able to fight for that win the way they did.

READ MORE: ‘I’m not there to crash you out’ – Verstappen shares details of post-Austria chat with Norris after ‘silly’ coming together

“Unfortunately probably not smart [from] them to throw away a win, for either of them. I’ll try make sure that if I’m in that position I don’t do the same!”

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