2025 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Race Review

Linus O'Howell
Dec 7
4 min read

Verstappen Win Not Enough as Norris Takes Maiden Crown

Despite a brilliant win for Max Verstappen, it wasn’t quite enough for the reigning World Champion as Lando Norris took his place as the 2025 Champion of the World! With Verstappen first and Norris third, it was Oscar Piastri who split the two to come home second, ultimately ending his Championship hopes (for this year anyway)!

The Biggest Talking Points

The main focus on this Race was very much at the start, and whilst Max Verstappen was able to remain in the lead coming out of Turn 1, Lando Norris would eventually drop down to third as teammate Oscar Piastri swooped around his outside at Turn 9! George Russell had another poor getaway, dropping two places down to 6th, but he was soon able to dispatch Fernando Alonso to move back into P5! Charles Leclerc was the driver who was initially putting the pressure on Lando for P3, but the Ferrari eventually dropped back as it was just too hard to overtake! However, after George Russell boxed relatively early, both Leclerc and Norris were forced to cover him off, meaning they both came out in an awful lot of traffic! Fortunately for those two, no one really put up much of a fight until Lando caught the back of Yuki Tsunoda! For some reason, Tsunoda didn’t play the game of holding Norris back in the final sector (which would’ve been the most efficient way to hold Lando up), and instead, he decided to weave a ridiculous amount of times down the main straight, with Norris overtaking Yuki off track! In some ways, I’m surprised Lando wasn’t penalised for this, given the strict rules that the FIA tends to stick to, but on the other hand, Tsunoda was driving erratically!

Out front, Oscar Piastri led the Race after Max Verstappen’s first pit stop, and Piastri ultimately went an awful long way on his tyres to try and give himself a “mega quick” final stint! Interestingly, Charles Leclerc’s decision to box a second time meant McLaren reacted with Lando Norris, but it was good in the Norris camp as he was comfortably running third! Elsewhere in the field, Lewis Hamilton had made good progress through the field to make it back into the points, but he wasn’t able to usurp Esteban Ocon for 7th, whilst a charging Lance Stroll made it all the way up from 17th to 9th in his final stint, only for both him and Oliver Bearman to receive 5-second time penalties for changing direction more than once (Lance was at least able to remain in the Top 10, though)! Whilst this was going on, Max Verstappen had already crossed the line to record his 8th victory of the season, with Oscar Piastri coming home second, as Lando Norris did enough to secure his maiden Formula 1 World Championship!

The Standout Drives in the Race

I’ve given out three 10’s for the 2025 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, and the first one is obviously for Max Verstappen! Even if it wasn’t quite enough, Max Verstappen once again showed that he is arguably the Greatest of All Time, and the fact that he’s managed to leave 2025 with more victories than anyone else this season speaks volumes to just how special Max truly is! The second driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Fernando Alonso, and wow, what an end to the season from the 2-time World Champion! Given Aston Martin’s performance plus the fact that he’s had plenty of things go against him, to end up P10 in the Drivers’ Championship is a pretty great effort from Fernando! And the final driver I’ve given a Perfect 10 to in 2025 is none other than Esteban Ocon! Esteban’s had a really difficult time for a large majority of the second part of this season, so to end it with a 7th-place finish is a fantastic wow to go out! Elsewhere, Oscar Piastri showed just how amazing he is when it comes to overtaking; he’ll be back next year, whilst Charles Leclerc did superbly well to stay in the fight for as long as he did! Nico Hulkenberg also deserves a mention for going from 18th to 9th to score 2 points in Kick Sauber’s final-ever Grand Prix, and of course, we have to end by talking about Lando Norris! Whilst it was very much in his hands, Lando never made a mistake today, and for that reason, he leaves Abu Dhabi as the 35th-ever Formula 1 World Champion! Trust me when I say we’ll talk about Lando’s season in a lot more detail in our usual end-of-season articles!

Drivers Who Had a Shocker

I’ve only given out one 1 for the final Race of the 2025 Formula 1 Season, and that is unfortunately for Franco Colapinto! There’s a part of me who feels like this is a little bit harsh, but if we’re being honest, Franco was incredibly slow today, even with his teammate's penalty he still finished last! Both Colapinto and Alpine need a big reset heading into the brand-new regulations in 2026! Other drivers I need to note are Yuki Tsunoda and Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who were both incredibly slow compared to their teammates (Yuki’s defence on Norris was also pretty abysmal), whilst Racing Bulls arguably left their worst Race of the season for last, with only the two Alpines finishing behind Isack Hadjar and Liam Lawson! Oh, and Alex Albon did my least favourite thing of speeding in the pitlane!