The 2024 Formula 1 season come to a close on Sunday with the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, with Max Verstappen already having clinched the driver's championship.
But Ferrari still has a shot to take the constructor title away from McLaren. It's a long shot, but anything can happen in Abu Dhabi, so keep an eye on where the two teams are at.
Below you will find our Formula 1 DraftKings DFS lineup picks for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on 12/8/24, with the slate locking at 8:00 a.m. EST. If you have any questions or want to talk about Formula 1, you can find me on X at @juscarts.
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Captain: Carlos Sainz Jr. ($14.7K)
Starts Third
This weekend, Carlos Sainz Jr. makes his final ride with Ferrari and he'll begin from the third position, the best starting spot from a non-McLaren driver.
🇦🇪 Solid Quali. I pushed like crazy and my lap was good, hundredths of a second away from P2. Believe me when I say I will drive my heart out to try to win and let’s see what happens! Races have to be raced, it’s not over until the checkered flag!
👉https://t.co/xw1VjCLMxP pic.twitter.com/tivJKoqWId
— Carlos Sainz (@Carlossainz55) December 7, 2024
With teammate Charles Leclerc getting hit with a 10-spot grid penalty, the pressure is on for Sainz as he attempts to close his Ferrari career out strong and put the team in a position to upset McLaren in the constructor's race.
I'm not sold on him actually being able to do that, but he'll have a great shot to finish on the podium and as the top Ferrari driver, since Leclerc will have to come from the 14th starting spot.
Constructor: Red Bull ($10.3K)
The way I built my main lineup this week, I had two options at constructor.
One was that I play McLaren and stack them with Oscar Piastri. Not a bad plan, but it relies on Piastri beating teammate Lando Norris to optimize my points, and I'm not sold on that.
The other was to play Norris and then drop down a bit to Red Bull at constructor. This is risky as well, since one Red Bull driver, Sergio Perez, has struggled much of this season.
Ultimately, wanting Norris in my lineup won out, and I'm taking the risk on Red Bull. Sergio Perez looks decently quick this weekend as he made it to Q3, and Ferrari and Mercedes both have cars starting deeper in the field who have to contend with traffic.
Lando Norris ($12.0K)
Starts First
I want Lando Norris in my lineups this weekend because the McLaren driver looks poised to win the season finale and send his team home as the constructor champions.
QUALIFYING CLASSIFICATION
McLaren in the box seat as they look to clinch their first constructors' title in a quarter of a century #F1 #AbuDhabiGP pic.twitter.com/TK0P2kDzmg
— Formula 1 (@F1) December 7, 2024
Norris made a late-season push at Max Verstappen for the driver's title but came up short. However, he's shown that he's going to be a major threat in 2025, potentially even entering the year as a slight favorite over the four-time champion Verstappen.
This weekend, Norris has been first or second on the speed charts in all three practices. McLaren has had five of the six top two spots, only losing out in FP1 when the team had Ryō Hirakawa in Piastri's car.
Pierre Gasly ($5.2K)
Starts Sixth
Here's the easiest play of the race: Pierre Gasly.
Gasly and this Alpine car have run really well lately. He's finished in the points in three of the last four races, including a podium at Interlagos and a fifth last week. The only time in that span that he failed to score points was in Vegas, where he qualified third but had an early mechanical failure.
So, that's part one of why I love this play: Gasly's been very hot lately.
Part two is that he faces virtually no teammate competition, giving him a near certainty in the race for the five DFS points there as long as he doesn't have the car break or crash.
Esteban Ocon usually is in that other car, but the team parted ways with him before this race, giving Jack Doohan, who'll race for the team in 2025, the spot.
Jack Doohan. Formula One driver. pic.twitter.com/mBr9LiE4Ot
— BWT Alpine Formula One Team (@AlpineF1Team) December 6, 2024
Doohan has struggled this weekend. He was 19th in FP1, 19th in FP2, 14th in FP3, and then last in qualifying.
Yuki Tsunoda ($4.4K)
Starts 11th
The RB cars start 11th and 12th this weekend, so really you can take your pick about which one you want to bet on sneaking into the points. I'm opting for Yuki Tsunoda, seeing as he scored points in two of the past three races, while Liam Lawson has struggled the past two races, finishing 16th in Vegas and 14th in Qatar.
Valtteri Bottas ($3.2K)
Starts Ninth
Sauber's late-season improvement continues as Valtteri Bottas qualified ninth on Saturday. One week after Guanyu Zhou earned the team's first points of the season and Bottas came in 11th, we have another shot to see a Sauber in the top 10.
This is the best Bottas has started in a race all season and just his second time reaching Q3. Zhou starts back in 17th, giving Bottas a good jump in the race for the "defeated teammate" points.
How Does Formula 1 Fantasy Work?
Here's how the scoring and format work for F1 DFS on DraftKings. You'll pick five drivers and a constructor. One of those drivers will be your captain, who earns you 1.5 times the points but also costs 1.5 times as much as they usually cost. For the constructor, you're choosing one of the F1 teams.
So here's how the scoring works. Your driver only gets points if they finish in the top 10. Here's a chart for how that breaks down:
| Finishing Spot | DraftKings Points |
|---|---|
| 1 | 25 |
| 2 | 18 |
| 3 | 15 |
| 4 | 12 |
| 5 | 10 |
| 6 | 8 |
| 7 | 6 |
| 8 | 4 |
| 9 | 2 |
| 10 | 1 |
In addition, the driver with the fastest lap of the race gets three points. You get 0.1 points per lap led, five points for beating your teammate, one point for being classified at the finish (finished 90% of the race, essentially), and points for place differential.
Finish three spots higher than your grid position, and you will get two points. Finish five better, and you get three points. Finish 10 better to get five points. You also lose points for a negative place differential, starting at three spots.
The constructor points work the same way, with some added points if both cars do well. It's confusing, but for Formula 1 DFS to work, it probably had to be confusing, considering the huge gaps in speed between various teams and the small driver pool.
