Sunday’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix will mark the 24th and final race of the 2025 Formula One season, and it will also determine which of three drivers—Lando Norris, Max Verstappen, or Oscar Piastri—will take home this year’s drivers’ championship. It’s been a long and chaotic campaign, and it’s all coming down to this last event. So ahead of this weekend, we answered 10 questions that could define the race—and potentially the season at large. Let’s dive in.
How did we get here?
Hello, and welcome to the first three-driver championship fight in F1 since 2010 and the closest title race we’ve had since 2021—one that, to this point, has somehow been even more outlandish to witness. (We’ll talk about Abu Dhabi 2021 in a bit.) Four-time champion Max Verstappen is defending his crown once again, but this time he’s spent the back half of the season chasing down two McLarens who, up until about two months ago, seemed to be the only drivers in contention. The lesson here is that you can never count a real winner out—even if he faced a 104-point championship deficit just three months ago.
The McLaren drivers involved are Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, the former an F1 veteran of seven years who's been followed by expectations of championship-level performance for at least half that time, and the latter a somewhat surprise contender—just don’t tell that to his agent, Mark Webber. Piastri had a monster start to the year, winning six races before the summer break and taking full advantage of a car that looked to be leaps and bounds better than its closest competitors. He had one slipup at the opening Grand Prix of the season—his home race in Australia—where he finished ninth, but that was largely a result of wet conditions. From China in March through Monza in early September, Piastri didn’t finish lower than fourth in a race and held a commanding lead over Norris.
The gap between Piastri and Norris after the Dutch Grand Prix in August was 34 points. There were just nine races and a handful of sprints to go, and Piastri had been showing a near-Verstappen-like level of self-assuredness. Since then, though, Piastri’s performance and reliability have taken a hit: He had a DNF in Baku after crashing on the first lap, three fifth-place finishes in a row between Austin and Brazil, and a disqualification in Las Vegas (as did Norris). And when Piastri opened a door for his competitors, Norris strolled right on through.
Since Zandvoort, Norris has had two victories and five podium finishes. He’s also started finding success in areas that were sticking points for him early in the season: qualifying, holding first-lap leads, and generally proving to be an immovable object on track. Through all this, Norris has taken the lead in the championship from Piastri, and he held a 24-point advantage over both Piastri and Verstappen going into Qatar last weekend.
At the Qatar Grand Prix, Oscar Piastri leads, followed by Max Verstappen and Lando Norris
So what happened in Qatar?
Funny you should ask. Norris entered the weekend—which featured both a sprint race and a Grand Prix—with a chance to lock up his first career drivers’ title. All he needed to do was come out at least 25 points ahead of Verstappen and Piastri, and nothing that happened in Abu Dhabi would have mattered. Hell, if he’d even managed to finish third in both Qatar events and in Abu Dhabi, he would have clinched the championship. Well, that didn’t happen.
Piastri won the sprint race, with Norris finishing third and Verstappen finishing fourth, so Piastri cut Norris’s lead down to 22 points. But Norris qualified in second place for the Grand Prix and had a shot at the start of the race to overtake his teammate and end this once and for all. Instead, Verstappen got by Norris quickly off the line, and McLaren made a decision that would come to haunt both Norris and Piastri the rest of the race.
On Lap 7, Nico Hulkenberg and Pierre Gasly made contact, prompting race officials to bring out a safety car. This presented a clear opportunity: In Qatar, pit stops take an average of 26 seconds to complete, but with a safety car slowing down the field, that drops to about 16 seconds. That’s a huge difference on a track where it’s notoriously difficult for cars to overtake one another even with large tyre deltas. So once the safety car came out, every car on the grid chose to make a quicker pit stop—except the McLarens. The team left both cars out under the guise of “maintaining flexibility” (there was a maximum 25-lap tyre restriction in Qatar, meaning that if cars pitted on Lap 7 of a 57-lap race, they’d have to run both of their next sets of tyres all the way to their 25-lap maximum), but in the moment, it seemed like an error or a way to avoid pitting one car over the other. McLaren CEO Zak Brown said it was an error after the race.
“We made the wrong decision," Brown told F1 TV. "You win and lose as a team but definitely not a great moment. Our evaluation if a Safety Car came out on that lap was clearly incorrect so we'll go back, study that. Nothing we can do about it now.”
Because of that call, Piastri eventually found himself behind Verstappen—and Norris found himself behind Verstappen, Piastri, Carlos Sainz, and Kimi Antonelli (although he’d get past Antonelli toward the end of the race). Verstappen went on to secure the victory—and 25 points. And when Norris was asked about McLaren’s mistake after the race, he said that he wanted to “go to bed.” Not great!
Here is where the leaderboard stands now:
- Norris: 408 points
- Verstappen: 396 points
- Piastri: 392 points
And there’s just one Grand Prix left to decide this whole thing?
There sure is! This is where things get interesting (and my extremely limited math skills get put to the test). Norris has a 12-point lead over Verstappen and a 16-point lead over Piastri. To win outright with no qualifiers, all Norris has to do is finish third or better, and the title is his.
Where things get messy is if that doesn’t happen. For a full breakdown of every possible title scenario, look at this piece from The Race. But from Verstappen’s side, he’d need to win and Norris would have to finish fourth or lower to take the championship; if Verstappen finishes second, Norris would need to finish eighth or lower (and Piastri couldn’t win); if he finishes third, Norris would need to be ninth or lower (and Piastri couldn’t win).
From Piastri’s side, he would need to win and Norris would have to finish sixth or lower, or Piastri would have to finish second and Norris would have to be 10th or lower and Verstappen fourth or lower.
There will be no ties if any of these drivers wins the race, but if somehow one of these pairings does finish level on points, the championship would go to Norris: The first tiebreaker is Grand Prix wins, of which all three drivers have seven; the second tiebreaker is second-place finishes, and Norris has eight while Verstappen has five and Piastri has four.
Lando Norris in the pit lane during the Qatar Grand Prix
What’s the case for Lando Norris winning this?
Well, he still has the lead, which is the biggest mark in his favor. Also, his recent stumbles have largely not been his fault. The disqualification in Las Vegas was due to excessive plank wear on his car; he didn’t make the strategy call in Qatar, and he actually questioned it on the radio, saying that he believed he should have followed Verstappen into the pits. Yes, he did make contact with Piastri on the opening lap of the Singapore Grand Prix, which led to unspecified “repercussions” from his team—but then Piastri took him out at the start of the sprint race in Austin, so I guess all’s fair in love and racing?
Seriously, though, all Norris has to do this weekend is finish third or better, and the championship is his. There really shouldn’t be heaps of pressure on him because he’s driving the best car on the grid, and he doesn’t even need to go out there and beat Verstappen. He just has to finish on the podium, something he’s done in five of the past seven races he’s finished. He should be just fine. He’s going to be just fine, isn’t he???
Max Verstappen celebrates his win after the Qatar Grand Prix
OK, what about Max Verstappen?
Did anyone else just hear the Jaws theme music in their head? Max’s case is that he’s the best F1 driver on the planet right now, plain and simple. He’s won the past four drivers’ championships (regardless of how you feel about 2021), and, again, he’s cut a 104-point deficit down to 12 points in just eight races and three sprints. If he comes out on top, he’d set a modern record for the largest comeback in the drivers’ championship, which would be unbelievable considering that his car looked so bad early in the season that Red Bull Racing fired team principal Christian Horner, who’d been with the outfit since its creation 20 years ago. If McLaren completed its collapse against Max, it would be the season-long F1 equivalent of blowing a 28-3 lead.
Since the start of September, Max hasn’t finished a Grand Prix not on the podium, and he’s won five out of eight races (plus a sprint in Austin). His results speak for themselves, and his reputation precedes him—as it should.
Max is known for being a ruthless competitor. He has the resting heart rate of a great white shark (I’m assuming) and the knowledge and skills to play around the edges of the rule book (and usually come out on top). He looms so large in the minds of his competitors that Zak Brown recently likened him to a horror movie villain. “Right as you think he's not coming back, he's back!” Brown said. Max responded, “He can call me Chucky.”
Fuck, he’s gonna win again, isn’t he?
Oscar Piastri ahead of the Qatar Grand Prix
How about Oscar Piastri?
It’s tough to see Piastri in this position after all his early-season success. He’s definitely the longest shot of these three competitors—he needs a lot of help from both guys above him to have a chance—and his recent form doesn’t inspire a lot of optimism. He hasn’t won a Grand Prix since Zandvoort in August, and while he likely would have won in Qatar had it not been for McLaren’s strategy blunder, that’s one weekend out of eight. In the past three and a half months, Piastri’s been much more likely to finish fifth in a race than on the podium. That form isn’t gonna cut it when your teammate is surging and Verstappen smells blood in the water.
Coming into the year, Piastri wasn’t expected to be in this position, and he’s shown phenomenal pace and resolve for a guy who’s in just his third season. I expect him to be in many more title fights in seasons to come—but then again, this is F1. There are so many great drivers, and only so many good cars and true championship opportunities to go around.
Who has the edge on the Yas Marina Circuit?
History tells us Max, as he won there in 2021, 2022, and 2023. But Lando earned a victory there last season. This is a 3.3-mile circuit with two DRS zones that’s defined by its long straight between Turns 5 and 6 and the slow-speed corners at its beginning and end. There used to be a couple of terrible chicanes here that were removed in 2021—to the great delight of drivers and fans alike. And although this isn’t one of the better circuits on the calendar, it’s one that could at least provide some interesting racing—and potentially some overtaking—on Sunday.
Didn’t we have drama here before?
Too soon. It’s too soon for me to have to revisit this, right? I mean, it’s been only four years. Couldn’t we make it five? Six? Two decades? I feel like I deserve hazard pay for wading back into these waters. But I digress.
Yes: In 2021, as Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton were battling it out for the drivers’ title in the last race of the season, we got hella drama. It started on Lap 53, when Nicholas Latifi (GOATifi, as some like to call him) crashed at Turn 14 and race officials brought out a safety car. Hamilton was leading and chose not to pit for fresh tyres because he would have lost track position and there were only five laps to go, but Verstappen pitted for new soft tyres behind him. Verstappen came back out in second place, but there were five lapped cars between him and Hamilton—and the race was still under a safety car.
Initially, lapped cars were informed that they would not be allowed to overtake the safety car because there was too much debris on track; in typical circumstances, these cars would be allowed to unlap themselves and rejoin the race on the same lap as everyone else. But then, on Lap 57, race director Michael Masi reversed course and allowed just the cars between Hamilton and Verstappen to unlap themselves, not all of the lapped cars, as the rules dictate, because then there wouldn’t have been time to restart the race. Quickly after that, race control brought the safety car in so that the final lap of the race could be run under green flag conditions. That put Verstappen directly behind Hamilton on much fresher tyres with one lap to chase him down. And he did exactly that.
Verstappen took the win and the drivers’ championship—and the sport was turned on its head. Masi was eventually fired for incorrectly applying safety car restart rules. The FIA overhauled its system for controlling and officiating F1 races. Mercedes, Hamilton’s team at the time, initially protested the race result but eventually decided not to pursue an appeal after entering into “constructive dialogue” with the FIA and Formula One about clarifying rules for the future. And while Verstappen officially won his first drivers’ title that season, many around the sport still apply an asterisk to the championship.
Will Masi be back for this event?
Depending on where you fall on the Sports Integrity Scale, you may not appreciate my answer to this question. But I wish! Did Masi absolutely botch the call in 2021 and effectively help Verstappen steal the drivers’ championship from Hamilton? You bet he did. Isn’t that bad? Yes! A thousand times yes!
But if you, like me, root for absolute chaos and want the wildest possible shit to happen in the final F1 race of the year, then you’re probably wishing for the Return of the Masi—or some sort of equivalent. Yeah, it’ll be nice if the conclusion of this race is legal so we don’t have a referendum on the entirety of the sport over the next few months (and long beyond that). But you can’t tell me you don’t still shout, “NO, MICHAEL, NO” in the voice of Toto Wolff whenever someone even moderately inconveniences your life. “So not right,” indeed.
So, who will win?
It should be Lando. The signs all point to him. All he has to do is finish third! He can do that. Right? Right???
See you Sunday.