2025 Miami Grand Prix Race Review

Linus O'Howell
1 day ago
4 min read

Piastri Wins Again to Take Miami Retribution

After a couple of winning opportunities got taken away from him, Oscar Piastri wasn’t to be denied a third time as he took his third-straight win to further extend his Championship lead! After early scraps, Lando Norris was able to come back through to P2 in a Race of pure McLaren domination, whilst the fortunate timing of a Virtual Safety Car handed George Russell the final spot on the Podium!

The Biggest Talking Points

At the start of the Race, Max Verstappen locked up into Turn 1, opening the door for Lando Norris to get alongside into the next corner, only for Max to push Lando wide to keep hold of the lead! This was a pretty aggressive move from Verstappen, it dropped Norris down to 6th, but I think no penalty was the right call! There was also another incident in Turn 1 which brought out a Virtual Safety Car as Jack Doohan collided with Liam Lawson, an incident that wrecked both drivers’ afternoons! When the Race got back underway, Max Verstappen led out front, but both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris were charging through the front runners as McLaren’s pace advantage was clear to see! We then got a great battle between Max and Oscar for the Race lead as both guys gave each other enough room, but in the end, Piastri was able to force Verstappen into a slight mistake to take the lead of the Miami Grand Prix! The next big think to talk about was we got Round 2 of the fight between Max and Lando, and once again, Norris was not convincing enough with his overtakes, he took far too long to pass the 4-time World Champion, and it meant that the gap to his McLaren teammate was over 9 seconds!

A few laps later, and another VSC was brought out for Oliver Bearman’s stricken Haas, and this massively played into the hands of George Russell who was able to jump both teammate Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Max Verstappen for P3 whilst Carlos Sainz lost his advantage to the Ferrari’s because of it! Another VSC was then called just a couple of laps later as Gabriel Bortoleto pulled to the side of the track, clearly the heat was effecting Ferrari power units! Towards the end of the Race, Alex Albon was able to clear Kimi Antonelli for P5 as McLaren continued to pull away out front, but there is one last thing we need to talk about, and that is Ferrari! Lewis Hamilton was on the back of Charles Leclerc on quicker medium tyres and he was asking Ferrari to let him through. Now this did happen eventually, but about 4 laps and 25 radio messages too late! What’s even worse about this is Lewis’ pace advantage had gone by the time he was let through because his tyres had overheated too much, and it then meant Ferrari let Leclerc back through towards the end of the Race as Charles was now the driver being held up! This was a complete and utter mess from Ferrari, they had no pace, they finished behind one Williams and lucked their way into finishing ahead of the other, and their strategy calls got ripped apart by their drivers. Absolutely unacceptable!

The Standout Drives in the Race

I’ve given out two 10’s for the 2025 Miami Grand Prix, and the first one is obviously for Oscar Piastri! Oscar did another terrific job here, he had so much pace, and he was decisive with his overtakes which is what saw him win for the third-straight Race! The other driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Alex Albon, and what a terrific job he did, for Alex to come home in P5 and just 11 seconds off the Podium is truly a special result for both him and Williams! I also thought Lando Norris had really good pace, but he needs to be more decisive with his overtaking, George Russell can be happy with his 4th Podium finish of the season whilst Max Verstappen defended brilliantly for the first third of the Race!

Drivers Who Had a Shocker

I must be making some kind of history now because for the third-straight week, I haven’t given anyone a 1 for this Race! However, if I could give a team a 1, it would be Aston Martin because their pace was absolutely shambolic here! Fernando had a spin and gained from a VSC to finish ahead of Lance Stroll, and they were both over 20 seconds behind the Kick Sauber in front, that’s shambolic! I’m also maybe being a little bit generous with the Liam Lawson-Jack Doohan incident, but both of their Races were ruined so it feels more like a racing incident!