Formula 1: Most likely 2021 driver lineup for Haas

With Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean both out, what is the most likely driver lineup for Haas for the 2021 Formula 1 season?

Haas have confirmed that neither Kevin Magnussen nor Romain Grosjean will be back with the team in the 2021 Formula 1 season, a season which would have been the fifth season of this particular pairing at the sport’s lone American team.

Grosjean has competed for Haas ever since they entered Formula 1 in 2016, and Magnussen has been his teammate since 2017 after replacing Esteban Gutierrez.

Through five seasons, only three drivers have ever competed for Haas. No two active drivers have been teammates for longer than the 28-year-old Dane and the 34-year-old Frenchman.

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Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton have been teammates at Mercedes since 2017, but no other duo have been together since prior to 2019.

But in 2021, they are slated to hire a new duo which will consist of their fourth and fifth different drivers all-time. What will that lineup look like?

While nothing has been confirmed, there is a clear most likely driver lineup for Haas next year, and it consists of current Formula 2 drivers Nikita Mazepin and Mick Schumacher.

Mazepin has substantial backing given the fact that his father, Russian billionaire Dmitry Mazepin, is in his corner.

The 21-year-old sits in sixth place in the driver standings with two victories and three additional podium finishes through 20 races this season after finishing in 18th in his rookie year last year with top finishes of eighth, and his father, who is the core shareholder and chairman of Uralchem Integrated Chemicals Company, is keen to get him to Formula 1 in the very near future.

And Haas could use the money.

As for Schumacher, the current Formula 2 points leader and member of the Ferrari Driver Academy, he had been rumored to end up at Alfa Romeo with both Kimi Raikkonen and Antonio Giovinazzi out of their contracts at the end of the year.

But it Alfa Romeo will not make any changes next year. Ferrari have the right to select one of their two drivers each year, and they are once again slated to go with Giovinazzi. Raikkonen, who recently broke the all-time Formula 1 starts record, recently signed an extension as well.

Additionally, one but only one of the Ferrari trio, which consists of Schumacher, Callum Ilott and Robert Shwartzman, is slated be promoted to Formula 1 for 2021, and Schumacher is in the best position for that promotion.