2004 Formula One World Championship
The 2004 FIA Formula One World Championship was the 58th season of FIA Formula One motor racing. It was the 55th FIA Formula One World Championship, and was contested over eighteen races from 7 March to 24 October 2004.
The championship was dominated by Michael Schumacher and Ferrari, with Schumacher winning the Drivers' Championship for the seventh and final time. Schumacher's teammate Rubens Barrichello finished the championship in second with Jenson Button coming in third for BAR. Ferrari won the Constructors' Championship for a record 14th time ahead of BAR and Renault.
In this championship, several records were broken. Michael Schumacher won 13 races, breaking his record of 11 race wins in one season from. A record that stood until when his compatriot Sebastian Vettel equalled it before being broken by Max Verstappen in. He also broke the record for most consecutive World Drivers' titles and Ferrari broke the record for most consecutive Constructors' titles.
As of 2026, this season was the last title for Bridgestone tyres against competition to date.
Teams and drivers
The following teams and drivers competed in the 2004 FIA Formula One World Championship.† All engines were 3.0 litre, V10 configuration.
Four of the ten teams, Ferrari, Renault, Jaguar, and Toyota, were subsidiaries of major car companies. However, BAR was a division of British American Tobacco. Williams and McLaren, both privately owned teams, had engine supply agreements with BMW and Mercedes-Benz respectively, and Honda produced engines for BAR.
The other three teams, Jordan, Sauber and Minardi, were also privately owned but received little substantial sponsorship and consequently tended to end up toward the back of the grid. Sauber received Ferrari engines badged under the Petronas name and received sponsorship from the Malaysian oil and gas company.
Free practice drivers
Five constructors entered free practice only drivers over the course of the season.– Leinders was entered as third driver for Round 1 but was refused a FIA Super Licence until he completed the required mileage in a Formula One car. He satisfied this requirement before the next race.
Driver changes
- The 2004 season featured several driver line-up changes prior to the season, and more changes during the season proper. Minardi, Jordan, and Sauber started 2004 with completely new driver line-ups.
- At BAR, following Jacques Villeneuve's departure from the team before the 2003 Japanese Grand Prix, former test driver Takuma Sato was permanently given the second race seat alongside Jenson Button; after serving in a temporary capacity during 2003, Anthony Davidson became the permanent test driver replacing Takuma Sato.
- At Minardi, Nicolas Kiesa was unable to keep his seat and was released. Jos Verstappen left Minardi as a result of sponsorship problems and an unwillingness to spend another year competing with other backmarkers in the non-competitive team. Gianmaria Bruni, who had performed a limited amount of testing in 2003, was signed to a full-time drive. Zsolt Baumgartner was confirmed as the second full-time driver after the Hungarian government provided sponsorship; Baumgartner had performed replacement duties at Jordan in 2003 after Ralph Firman suffered injuries from a crash in Hungary. Completing the all-new line-up, Bas Leinders and Tiago Monteiro were signed as test drivers for 2004. Leinders was signed from the ranks of the World Series by Nissan, while Monteiro was signed from the American Fittipaldi Champ Car team.
- Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Sauber mutually parted ways at the end of 2003. Frentzen then moved out of F1 and joined fellow ex-F1 drivers Mika Häkkinen and Jean Alesi in the DTM. Nick Heidfeld was also released by Sauber, and appeared to have no drive for 2004. However several successful test drives at Jordan landed him a seat there. Fisichella left Jordan after 2003 having signed a drive for Sauber. This meant that Heidfeld and Fisichella effectively swapped seats. Sauber's other new driver was Felipe Massa, who left his test position at Ferrari and returned to the team where he had raced in 2002. As Sauber used Ferrari engines in 2003, Massa took considerable knowledge of Ferrari components with him.
- Choosing not to extend Justin Wilson's contract, Jaguar signed Christian Klien to partner Mark Webber in the R5. Wilson turned down a test drive and departed Jaguar to join the Mi-Jack Conquest Racing team in Champ Car racing in America. Björn Wirdheim was signed as their Friday test driver. The other Friday test drivers are Franck Montagny, who was rewarded for a championship year in the World Series by Nissan with a permanent test drive at Renault, Ryan Briscoe, who joined Ricardo Zonta as a test driver at Toyota, and Pedro de la Rosa, who returned to F1 as a test driver for McLaren.
Mid-season changes
- Giorgio Pantano was replaced by Timo Glock at the. Pantano left Jordan after the, with Glock replacing him again for the remainder of the season.
- After Ralf Schumacher was injured during the, Marc Gené replaced him at the French and British Grands Prix. Antônio Pizzonia then replaced him from the to the. Schumacher returned for the.
- Cristiano da Matta was replaced by test driver Ricardo Zonta from the onward. Zonta was dropped by Toyota for the before replacing Olivier Panis at the, who stepped down from his race seat and retired from the sport.
- Jarno Trulli's relationship with the Renault team deteriorated after his first victory at the 2004 Monaco Grand Prix. He left the team after the 2004 Italian Grand Prix, which was also Pantano's last race for the Jordan team. Former world champion Jacques Villeneuve replaced Jarno Trulli at Renault for the final three races. Trulli missed the 2004 Chinese Grand Prix, but he returned in the 2004 Japanese Grand Prix and the 2004 Brazilian Grand Prix with the Toyota team. That meant the 2004 Japanese Grand Prix was Jarno Trulli's first race with the new team.
Team changes
- As part of a global restructuring and cost-cutting exercise, Ford announced during the season that they would not be entering into the F1 championship in 2005 via their Jaguar team. They also announced that their Cosworth motor and engineering divisions were being sold. The Jaguar team was eventually bought by Red Bull and continued to compete under the Red Bull Racing name in 2005.
Regulation changes
Qualifying was held entirely on Saturday and divided into two sessions, in each of which the driver was only allowed to complete one fast lap. In the first session, the drivers started in the order in which they finished the previous race. This served to determine the order for the second session, which then determined the starting positions for the race. The second session took place directly after the first. The drivers drove in the reverse order of the first qualifying session. The warm-up on Sunday was abolished.
The 2004 season also saw a change in technical regulations, including banning fully-automatic gearboxes and launch control, both of which had been used for the past three seasons. 2004 was the first time since the beginning of that cars competed without these systems. However, the use of traction control was still permitted by the FIA, and continued to be allowed for use over the next three seasons, until it was banned for the 2008 season.
To reduce costs, a rule was introduced that each engine must last the entire race weekend. If an engine needs to be replaced during the weekend, the driver will be penalized by a ten-place grid penalty.
The speed limit in the pit lane was increased from 80 km/h to 100 km/h. However, in some cases this was waived for safety reasons.
Calendar
The 2004 Formula One calendar featured two new events: the Bahrain Grand Prix and the Chinese Grand Prix, held at two newly built circuits in Sakhir and Shanghai. The season featured the most races outside Europe to that point; eight Grands Prix were held in the Americas, Asia, and Oceania. The Brazilian Grand Prix moved from its traditional early season slot to become the season finale, whereas the United States Grand Prix moved from its previous date in late September to late June as a back-to-back race with the Canadian Grand Prix.The only exit was the Austrian Grand Prix, after seven years of racing at the A1-Ring, the modified circuit old Österreichring. The grandstands and pit buildings were demolished during the year, rendering the track unusable for any motorsport category. The circuit eventually reopened in 2011 as the Red Bull Ring and was later reinstated to the F1 calendar in 2014.
Season report
Opening rounds
dominated the opening weekend at Albert Park in Australia, comfortably locking out the front row in qualifying and earning a 1–2 in the race. Michael Schumacher set the fastest lap of the race on his way to a lights-to-flag victory, with teammate Rubens Barrichello and Renault's Fernando Alonso joining him on the podium. Schumacher followed that up with another pole and victory at Sepang, finishing ahead of Juan Pablo Montoya and Jenson Button, the British driver scoring his first career podium and the BAR Honda team's best result since the 2001 German Grand Prix. Mark Webber, who split the Ferraris in qualifying in his unfancied Jaguar, suffered a poor start before colliding with Ralf Schumacher and spinning out.Formula One's first visit to the Arab world since the 1958 Moroccan Grand Prix took place at the Bahrain International Circuit. The Ferrari duo of Schumacher and Barrichello once again finished 1–2 in both qualifying and the race, with Button's second consecutive podium elevating him to third in the Drivers' Championship as the series headed for Europe.