This year’s midfield battle in F1 is already looking very exciting. Last season’s battle of the mid-packers saw clear domination by Mercedes-powered teams, with Force India narrowly beating Williams at the top. But, with testing over and the constructors potentially looking more competitive, things could look a bit different this season.

Since it’s hard to draw pretictions from testing, I’ll introduce two other factors I’ve focused on in looking at this year’s packed midfield; driver changes and overall team confidence. And there’s a lot going on in both areas.

Starting with driver changes, five out of the six teams in the midfield are entering the Australian GP with a new face. But, how many are actually upgrades?

Force India: See you later. Nico Hulkenberg ended his second stint with Force India to join Renault this offseason. Although the German has shown his talent since joining the sport in 2010, the results haven’t exactly shown up, as he’s yet to score a single F1 podium. Because of this, a change of scenery may have been Hulkenberg’s best option, and with this hole to fill, Force India have found one of the best young talents on the grid. Esteban Ocon impressed in his short stint with Manor (RIP), and transitioning to the far superior Force India car could see him fighting for podiums. But at this point, with such a small sample size, it’s hard to tell if Ocon will be able to match Hulkenberg’s pace in the bubble gum car (Can that be a new thing? Can we please call it that?). With that degree of uncertainty, I’ll call this replacement a slight downgrade… for now.

Williams: There’s no need for me to wait until the end to tell you my prediction. This is a straight downgrade for Williams. No fault to them, though. The initial idea of replacing a declining (sorry) Felipe Massa with Lance Stroll was a decent one. Granted, I don’t expect Stroll to be impressing anyone off the bat, but having him play in a secondary role to Valterri Bottas could have worked out fine for them. But, Nico’s little secret turned out to hurt Williams the most, as they lost their number one man to Mercedes, and Massa was forced to step in and save the day. Let’s be real here, Massa isn’t quite the same as he was with Ferrari. Bottas outscored him on nearly a race-to-race basis in their time together. And Stroll… well, I don’t think we’ve seen the last of this.

McLaren: I’m one of Jenson’s biggest fans, don’t get me wrong, but it’s no question he had a bad year last season. Even taking into effect a very slow McHonda engine, his Spanish counterpart outscored him by 33 points, and retirement (or a break… please Jenson) makes sense. As it is with Ocon, Stoffel Vandoorne’s limited F1 experience makes it hard to judge his future success. But, considering he’s the 2015 GP2 Champion, and Jenson was definitely trending downward, I’ll call this a slight upgrade.

Toro Rosso: Somehow, Kvyat kept his job, so it looks like we’ll be seeing at least one more year of intense ping pong action before Gasly takes his seat.

Haas: Upgrade. Massive massive upgrade. Gutierrez couldn’t score a point if his F1 career depended on it… which is exactly what happened, as the Mexican is headed to Formula E. Kevin Magnussen, on the other hand, actually has the talent to challenge Romain Grosjean and, dare I say, score a fucking point.

Renault: The aforementioned Nico Hulkenberg will head the operation of bringing the bruised banana car (which should also be a thing) from the basement to the midfield. Key word: head. As much as I love K-Mag, he doesn’t quite fit the role of a true first driver yet. Hulk, on the other hand, represents a clear superior to Jolyon Palmer. Big upgrade here.

New faces: check… confidence: huge check. Most of these midfield teams have big goals set for next season, with Haas targeting an improvement from their 7th place effort last season, Renault and Toro Rosso both targeting 5th, and Force India dreaming of knocking off a top team and finishing 3rd. Yes, 3rd. Obviously, not everyone will meet those goals, but it’s not impossible to think we’ll see a surprise contender coming out of the midfield.

Williams and McLaren will most likely see down years. Williams have an inferior driver lineup from last year, and although they still have the advantage of a Mercedes power unit, repeating their 5th place performance may be tough without Bottas. And McLaren, based on testing, haven’t exactly fixed any of their power or reliability issues of the past few years, and 6th place may be a stretch with lower teams expecting huge seasons.

Amongst the more… ambitious teams, I see Force India finishing atop the midfield again. While there’s a solid 1% chance they’ll actually meet their 3rd place goal, I don’t see anyone else in the midfield challenging them. Their drivers are young and talented, their car is as fast (and pink) as it’s ever been, and they looked solid in testing. That’s good enough for me.

Yes, I’ve officially climbed aboard the Renault hype-train. Not only were they finally able to build their own car without any ties to Lotus, but the addition of Hulkenberg can help them skyrocket up the table. Couple that with their huge works-team budget and Renault have the potential to meet their goal.

Not too far behind should be Haas. Gene’s team also enjoyed a very solid week of testing, and having two drivers who are actually good enough to score points should help them improve from 7th place.

Toro Rosso’s season is tough to predict. On one hand, they’re the only midfield team with the same driver lineup as 2016. But on the other, they’re the only team on the grid who are changing engine providers. Because of that, their entire season will depend on that transition, so it wouldn’t be too surprising to see a down year while they adjust.

Flaming-hot tot take (2017 constructors):

TBD TBD TBD Force India (no change from 2016) Renault (+4) Williams (-1) Haas (+1) McLaren (-2) Toro Rosso (-2) Sauber (didn’t quite mention them in the article… but did I really have to?)