Reacting to My 2025 Formula 1 Season Predictions

We finally made it to the end of another Formula 1 Season, and as a result, it’s time to do one of my favourite articles of the year: Prediction Reactions! I made these predictions back in March, and the reason I enjoy looking back at my picks so much is because they’re usually very wrong! However, they can also be quite fascinating, and as always, there will be 3 sections to cover: Starter Predictions, Drivers’ Championship, and Constructors’ Championship! So, let’s laugh together!

Credit: The Race

10 Starter Predictions

My first Starter Prediction was “There will be 7 different Race Winners in 2025”! Yeah, I’m already laughing because we didn’t come anywhere near to this total, with just 4 different driver’s winner over the course of the 2025 Season (Norris, Piastri, Verstappen, and Russell)!

My second Starter Prediction was “6 different teams will end up on the Podium this year”! I actually went too low with this one, as 7 different teams had at least 1 Podium appearance this year, with only Aston Martin, Haas, and Alpine failing to join in with the fun! This is one of those predictions were I’m quite happy to be wrong!

My third Starter Prediction was “There will be 4 different Sprint Winners in 2025”! This is indeed my first correct prediction of this article, with Lando Norris, Max Verstappen, Oscar Piastri, and Lewis Hamilton all securing P1 finishes over the 6 Sprint Races across the year! Also, fun fact, this is the second-straight year I’ve correctly predicted the right amount of Sprint Winners!

My fourth Starter Prediction was “Andrea Kimi Antonelli will win a Sprint Race this year”! Unfortunately, I sort of struck the crossbar here as Kimi took a fabulous Sprint Pole in Miami, but he wasn’t able to hold on during the Sprint Race itself, whilst Antonelli also came home second in the Sao Paulo Sprint! So close, yet so far!

My fifth Starter Prediction was “Not every driver will score points, but every team will”! This very much happened, as neither Jack Doohan nor Franco Colapinto managed to score any points over the course of 2025, but Alpine as a whole scored 22 points thanks to Pierre Gasly! I’m happy with this one!

My sixth Starter Prediction was “23 different drivers will start a Race this year”! My reasoning for this prediction was simply that I wanted to go a little bold, but this definitely didn’t come true as only Jack Doohan was replaced from the original starting grid!

My seventh Starter Prediction was “Alex Albon will suffer the most DNF’s this season”! Alex did DNF 4 times this year, meaning I wasn’t a million miles away, but the actual record belonged to both Fernando Alonso and Liam Lawson (who both DNF’d 5 times each)!

My eighth Started Prediction was “There will be teammate tension towards the front of the field”! I would say this was correct, because even though things were harmonious for the most part, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri both had their aggrievances with one another at certain points, particularly Oscar in Singapore!

My ninth Starter Prediction was “Lando Norris will have more Pole Positions than anyone in 2025”! I came so close to getting this one correct, with Lando taking 7 Poles across the year, but a Pole Position in the final Race of the year for Max Verstappen put him onto 8 Poles in 2025, meaning I was ultimately wrong! I’m honestly very impressed that Max got more Poles than anyone!

And my final Starter Prediction of 2025 was “There won’t be any home winners in 2025”! I came super close to getting this correct, with only Lando Norris’ win in Silverstone thwarting me! This was my big Bold Prediction heading into 2025, so I’m actually impressed that I came so close to getting this one correct!

Drivers’ Championship

P20: Jack Doohan

The writing was sort of on the wall for Jack Doohan heading into 2025, with it being pretty easy to predict him to finish last given the fact that he wasn’t expected to last in the sport for very long. Sadly, that came true as Jack didn’t manage to score a single point before he was dropped in Miami, and what’s even worse is I don’t even get a point for this pick because Doohan finished 21st (behind his replacement Franco Colapinto)!

P19: Isack Hadjar

Oh, my goodness me! I called Isack Hadjar a “Diamond in the Rough” heading into this season, stating that he had an awful lot of speed and potential if he could unlock it! Clearly, I didn’t think Isack would unlock that this year, but I was completely wrong as Hadjar ended up as the Rookie of the Year, with his brilliant Podium finish in Zandvoort propelling him to 12th in the Standings! Honestly, Isack Hadjar deserved to finish in the Top 10, so this has to go down as one of my infamous shambolic predictions!

P18: Gabriel Bortoleto

I came close with this one! Gabriel Bortoleto entered Formula 1 having won Formula and Formula 2 back-to-back, and I firmly backed him to be the most impressive Rookie of 2025! I’d say that wasn’t the case, as even though Gabby had some great moments (P6 in Hungary was terrific), his Race pace ultimately lacked as he ended up 19th in the Championship!

P17: Nico Hulkenberg

I was completely wrong with this prediction, and for a number of reasons! I expected Nico Hulkenberg to perform well again after a brilliant year with Haas, but my expectations surrounding Kick Sauber were so low that I thought points would be at a premium! Ultimately, I was wrong completely as The Hulk ended up finishing all the way up in 11th, with his standout moment being that insane maiden Podium in Silverstone!

P16: Yuki Tsunoda

I love how I made this prediction with Yuki Tsunoda in the Racing Bulls, and yet I was still only one place off! I expected Yuki to beat his Rookie teammate in 2025, but I only had him down in 16th due to my lack of belief in Racing Bulls! All of these thoughts sort of became redundant when Tsunoda was promoted to the main Red Bull team after just 2 rounds, but to say it’s been tough would be an understatement, with just 7 points-scoring weekends for the Japanese star during his time in the big team! It’s absolutely insane that Yuki Tsunoda finished lower than I expected him to be in an even worse car!

P15: Alex Albon

Well, this one I was very wrong about! I didn’t really seem to have much reasoning for putting Alex Albon down in 15th, probably because of recent Williams seasons, but Alex absolutely smashed my expectations to end all the way up in 8th! Not only would I have never expected that level of performance from Williams, but I also didn’t ever expect Albon to outscore his teammate, so fair play!

P14: Lance Stroll

This is sort of one of those odd predictions where the driver finished lower than I predicted but performed better than I expected! I didn’t have the biggest of high hopes for Lance Stroll and Aston Martin heading into 2025, and Stroll eventually came out of the year in P16! However, Lance did have 5 or so great results, something I probably wouldn’t have expected to happen this year!

P13: Carlos Sainz

Wow, I really didn’t expect much out of Williams! Carlos Sainz finished a lot higher than this, ending up 9th overall, but I was also wrong in that he didn’t beat his teammate in the standings! Also, I never imagined that Carlos would ever be in a position to fight for Podiums in 2025, and instead, Sainz scored two (plus a third in the COTA Sprint)! Insane!

P12: Fernando Alonso

I can’t even say I was close with this prediction, because my reasoning for putting Fernando Alonso in 12th was completely wrong! I expected Fernando’s performance to drop this year due to a lack of motivation, but if anything, he performed at a very good level throughout most of the season, earning six Top 7 finishes (it should’ve been a lot more) on his way to sneaking into the Top 10 after Abu Dhabi’s Season Finale! I’d say that Aston Martin were potentially even worse than I expected, but Fernando drove better than my expectations!

P11: Oliver Bearman

There are two reasons why I got this prediction wrong! Firstly, I expected Haas to be a lot better than they were! And secondly, I expected Oliver Bearman to come out second best to his more experienced teammate, and that very much didn’t happen! Ultimately, Ollie Bearman ended up finishing 13th in the Championship, and his form towards the end of the year was far better than earlier in the season!

P10: Esteban Ocon

Yeah, no! I had high hopes for both Haas and Esteban Ocon heading into 2025, and it seemed to be looking good after a terrific P5 in China! However, the second half of the year was far tougher for Esteban, with the Frenchman finishing all the way down in P15, behind his Rookie teammate! Not a good job from either Ocon or me here!

P9: Pierre Gasly

Speaking of not doing a good job! Pierre Gasly’s 2025 was a bit of a disaster, not because of his own performances, but because Alpine decided to deliver him a pretty woeful car! Pierre only managed to score points in a quarter of the 2025 calendar, and I honestly feel bad for him! As for my prediction, saying Gasly would finish “Best of the Rest” is actually quite comical when you look back at it!

P8: Liam Lawson

Where do I start with this?! Liam Lawson started the year at Red Bull Racing, and I firmly expected a very difficult year for him! What actually happened is Liam got dumped back down to Racing Bulls after just 2 weekends at the main team, meaning he ended up finishing 14th in the Championship! However, despite all of that, it wasn’t much of a demotion for Lawson as he still managed to score more points than the guy who replaced him, and his actual performances were pretty solid! The best part about this prediction is it means that I know I got the next one right!

P7: Andrea Kimi Antonelli

Yay, I finally got one right! In terms of expectations, I’m not sure they could’ve been any bigger than what they were on Andrea Kimi Antonelli heading into this season, with people touting him to succeed straight from the off! Funnily enough, that’s exactly what happened, and it’s exactly the opposite of how I expected it to go! However, I was right in the fact that Kimi would find his best form in the second part of the year, with his results from Azerbaijan onwards being pretty strong! If I get Antonelli’s finishing position right next year, I’d be very impressed!

P6: Lewis Hamilton

Another one! My expectations of Lewis Hamilton’s first year in red were a lot lower than most people, with me expecting quite a difficult transition for the 7-time World Champion! Weirdly, Lewis’ season got worse as it went on, with him only just barely holding onto 6th in Abu Dhabi! 86 points off your teammate is not the start that Hamilton or Ferrari would’ve wanted!

P5: Oscar Piastri

This was always an incredibly tricky prediction for me to make, because I firmly believed that Oscar Piastri could fight for the World Drivers’ Championship due to McLaren’s car, but I ended up putting him down in 5th due to how highly I rated the drivers above him! Of course, Oscar didn’t just challenge for his first World Championship, but he led it for most of the season, losing out on the Title by only 13 points! I actually think this is a great representation of just how far Piastri has grown (rather than my predictions being awful)!

P4: George Russell

What can I say, I know my Mercedes’ drivers! George Russell was someone that I believed had an outside shot at this year’s World Championship due to his incredible pace and consistency, but it would ultimately come down to whether Mercedes could produce a consistently strong car! In fairness to George, he was very consistent throughout 2025, but unfortunately, Mercedes only delivered him a winning car on two occasions, meaning Russell ended up 104 points off becoming World Champion!

P3: Charles Leclerc

I fully meant what I said at the start of the year that Charles Leclerc is more than capable of winning a World Championship, and honestly, the only reason I had him to finish third was because of my reservations surrounding Ferrari! Clearly, those reservations weren’t high enough as Ferrari’s “terrible” car meant Charles could only finish 5th in the Championship, 181 points off the eventual Champion! That’s actually pretty horrific reading because Leclerc is far too good for that, and you certainly wouldn’t have seen me (or anyone) predicting Charles not to win a single Race in 2025!

P2: Lando Norris

Lando Norris was a lot of people’s favourite for the Title heading into this season, and at the time it made total sense! I went against it, simply because I couldn’t vote against the reigning Champion, and for a lot of the year, Lando didn’t look good enough to become Champion! However, Norris managed to turn it around, overtaking his teammate whilst holding off Verstappen to secure his maiden World Title! I’m honestly not surprised that this prediction was wrong; it just didn’t play out the way I expected it too!

P1: Max Verstappen

If I remember correctly, I never saw anyone predict Max Verstappen to win his 5th World Championship in 2025, and with good reason! Red Bull hadn’t delivered the best of cars for a lot of 2024, and the team was in complete turmoil, both on and off the track! I even said that I had more confidence in the likes of Norris, Leclerc, and Russell to end the year as Champion, but I simply couldn’t vote against Max because he is the best driver in the world! Now, whilst I did end up being wrong, Verstappen nearly clutched this for me, despite being 104 points behind at one point!

Constructors’ Championship

P10: Kick Sauber

Whilst it might seem like I wasn’t far off with my prediction for Kick Sauber, I can assure you I was! I thought Kick Sauber would continue to languish at the back of the pack and saying that I thought Sauber would score more than 4 points isn’t much of an achievement! However, the reason why I’m so wrong is Sauber ending up scoring a whopping 70 points, with five Top 7 finishes, including that special Podium for Nico Hulkenberg in Silverstone! The fact that Kick Sauber scored 66 points more than they did in 2024 and only finished 1 place higher is actually kind of insane!

P9: Racing Bulls

Yeah, I was nowhere near with this one! I expected Racing Bulls to struggle on more than one front, with me labelling Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar as the worst teammate pairing on the grid! The funniest part about all of this is not only did Tsunoda swap with Liam Lawson just 2 weekends later, but I even mentioned the fact that AlphaTauri were amazing in 2021, and I still didn’t back them to do well! Ultimately, Racing Bulls scored 92 points on their way to 6th in the Constructors’, with Isack Hadjar earning the team a Podium in Zandvoort!

P8: Williams

How did the three teams I expected to do the worst all end up on the Podium?! You could honestly tell that I was probably going to be wrong about Williams as soon as you saw Testing, as Williams had a lot of smiles coming out of Bahrain! Those smiles were clearly justified as Williams ended up with their best season in a decade, finishing 5th in the Constructors’ Championship with 3 trophies (2 Grand Prix Podiums, 1 Sprint Podium)! Pretty impressive!

P7: Aston Martin

I always get Aston Martin right! I knew that Aston Martin wouldn’t deliver a particularly good car in 2025, and the reason I put them to finish 7th was because that’s their favourite finishing position (dating all the way back to the Racing Point days)! Funnily enough, I was spot on, with Aston earning just one Top 5 finish (in a Grand Prix) all season! The ironic part about this prediction, though, is I would’ve expected Aston Martin to score a lot less than 89 points, so they’re also kind of overperformed at the same time (god help us)!

P6: Alpine

Jeez! This is a pretty horrendous prediction on my half, particularly as I said that “I would be stunned” if Alpine didn’t finish in the Top 6! In fact, I thought P5 was very much still on for the French team, and how wrong I was as Alpine were comfortably the worst team in 2025, scoring just 22 points, 48 less than the next best team! Honestly, both me and Alpine deserve the sack!

P5: Haas

This is such a weird prediction to grade! On the one hand, I was wrong, as Haas didn’t come close to being best of the rest, finishing well off in 8th! However, at the same time, I did say that this would be Haas’ best-ever season in the sport, and points-wise, it was second only to 2018 (where they did finish 5th in the Constructors’)! I feel like this is the best illustration I can give as to how crazy the midfield battle has been in 2025, and it’s honestly been my favourite thing to keep an eye on!

P4: Mercedes

This is fascinating! I correctly predicted both George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s finishing positions in the Drivers’ Standings, and yet, I predicted Mercedes to finish 4th in the Constructors’ Championship, when they actually finished as runners-up! This very much shows that two of the other teams didn’t meet expectations at all, but as for Merc, they had a decent year, with 2 Wins and 2 Poles for George (whilst Kimi got Sprint Pole in Miami)!

P3: Red Bull Racing

Amazingly, I got this one right! However, this year didn’t at all go how I expected it too, with Red Bull Racing struggling massively for a lot of the year, particularly when it came to their dreaded second seat! Max Verstappen also struggled a lot, although he managed to come within 2 points of winning his 5th Drivers’ World Championship, and yeah, 8 wins was all that Red Bull could achieve in 2025!

P2: Ferrari

Oh no! I’m already concerned about this prediction because I started it by saying “P2 in the Constructors’ is simply not good enough for Ferrari”, and if that’s the case, what is P4! I didn’t back Ferrari to win it because they didn’t win it with Carlos Sainz, but I didn’t expect the Scuderia to fall off a cliff, with 0 Grand Prix wins and less than 400 points looking like the boldest of predictions heading into 2025! Actually ridiculous, sort it out Ferrari!

P1: McLaren

At least I got the Constructors’ Champions right this year! This felt like a pretty straightforward prediction to make, with McLaren entering the season with arguably (in my opinion) the best driver lineup, and definitely with the best car! However, I didn’t expect McLaren to walk it by over 364 points, and if we’re being totally honest, the team should’ve scored a lot more than that! In fact, 14 wins doesn’t seem like a lot given the performance difference between McLaren and the rest of the field, but hey, at least I got my prediction right!