What does ‘interval’ mean in F1?

Formula One has enticed a raft of new fans in recent times for a variety of reasons.

Most notably the Netflix series Drive to Survive has brought the storylines in the pitlane to a new audience and got them hooked, while Lewis Hamilton’s move to Ferrari in 2025 is arguably F1’s biggest ever transfer.

But ahead of the 2025 campaign, the sport remains impenetrable at the best of times, with TV commentators and analysts using racing terminology and F1 jargon which make races difficult to understand for the casual fan.

One of those terms is ‘interval’ which you often see on the live leaderboard during a race and occasionally mentioned by the commentary team.

An ‘interval’ will often be noted on the side of the live leaderboard on TV during a race.

It is usually written next to the driver’s name leading the race, and beneath next to the second-placed driver will be a time such as +3.450.

The time indicates that the driver in second is 3.450 seconds behind the leader.

The same meaning will apply for all the times in the column next to drivers’ names under the word ‘interval’. So interval simply means the time gap between the named driver and the one ahead.

The interval is not just important for telling us who is close to an overtaking manoeuvre but also indicates which drivers can deploy the help of DRS – the drag reduction system.

DRS is allowed at designated parts of the track, usually long straights, so long as a car is within one second of the car in front.

Once inside the one-second mark, the chasing driver can use DRS which opens the car’s back wing, literally reducing drag so the car speeds up.

This makes overtaking easier throughout races, though can cause problems with ‘DRS trains’ in the midfield where numerous cars are within one second of each other, cancelling out the DRS impact.