2025 Austrian Grand Prix Race Review

Linus O'Howell
Jun 29
3 min read

Norris Holds on to Win after Early Fight with Piastri

After an early scrap with his teammate, Lando Norris never looked back as he took a crucial victory in his Championship fight! Oscar Piastri secured another McLaren 1-2 whilst Charles Leclerc rounded out the Podium in Austria!

The Biggest Talking Points

Before the Race could even begin, drama unfolded as Carlos Sainz’s Williams got stuck in first gear before eventually catching fire in the rear brake ducts, resulting in a DNF before we even got going! What a disaster for Carlos, nothing is going right for him! When the Race actually got underway, Oscar Piastri was able to dispatch Charles Leclerc for second into Turn 1, but he wasn’t able to clear Lando Norris as Andrea Kimi Antonelli made a big mistake to wipe both himself and Max Verstappen out of the Grand Prix before they’d even made it to Turn 4! Championship over?! The action then became all about the two McLarens as Piastri consistently put Norris under pressure, but not by enough to truly take the lead! In fact, the closest moment came at Turn 4 when Oscar nearly wiped Lando out, but this just led to Norris pitting as Piastri stayed out on his flat-spotted tyre, meaning by the time the Aussie pit, he was over 6 and a half seconds off the lead! Honestly, this was a really poor strategy from an Oscar Piastri point of view!

After this, nothing much happened other than the scrap in the midfield, with big points being available after some of the top cars suffered DNF’s! Yuki Tsunoda wiped out Franco Colapinto at Turn 4, resulting in a 10-second time penalty whilst Colapinto would later receive his own penalty after pushing Oscar Piastri onto the grass! As a lapped car, this was pretty abysmal driving from Franco! George Russell was completely in no man’s land for Mercedes, that car was horrendous today, and the action toward the end of the Race came down to Gabriel Bortoleto hunting down Fernando Alonso, who had been trying to pass Liam Lawson for pretty much the entire GP! Unfortunately, the Alonso-Bortoleto battle was halted a little early as Lando Norris came through to lap them, and whilst Oscar Piastri did gain time back, it just wasn’t enough!

The Standout Drives in the Race

I’ve given out three 10’s for the 2025 Austrian Grand Prix, and the first one is obviously for Lando Norris! Lando did what he needed to do today; he kept Oscar behind in order to get the preferential treatment, and that was enough for him to take a very important third victory of the season! The second driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Liam Lawson, and talk about needing a superb result, that was Liam, and he did absolutely brilliantly today to hold on for a massive 8 points! The final driver I’ve given a Perfect 10 to is Gabriel Bortoleto, and he fully merits this, maiden points is always impressive, but this even more so because this was fully on merit. Gabby’s pace was excellent! I also thought Oscar Piastri’s pace was really strong, I think he was just as quick, if not slightly (and I mean slightly) quicker than his teammate today whilst Charles Leclerc got the maximum result he could to return to the Podium for Ferrari! Fernando Alonso did a superb job to hold on to P7 at the end, really impressive driving whilst Nico Hulkenberg capped off a pretty special day for Kick Sauber with a last to 9th finish! Oh, and Esteban Ocon also scored another point for Haas (so good job to him)!

Drivers Who Had a Shocker

I’ve given out two 1’s for today’s Race, and the first one is for Yuki Tsunoda! Not only did Yuki finish last, but he bumped Lance Stroll off the track at one point, and he spun Franco Colapinto around! Tsunoda was also the only driver to finish 2 laps down, and this is unacceptable! The other driver I’ve given the worst possible grade to is Andrea Kimi Antonelli because Kimi completely messed his braking point up and took another driver out of the Race as a result! Elsewhere, Franco Colapinto had little pace before he stupidly put Piastri onto the grass, and Williams had yet another shocker with a double DNF!