With impressive aplomb, Max Verstappen secured his eighth win of the season at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Sunday. He has won more races this year than Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in the McLaren, each with seven Grand Prix victories. However, first place at the Yas Marina Circuit was no longer enough for the big coup; Lando Norris secured the first world title of his career with his third place.
In hers sport.de-Debrief on the Formula 1 race in Abu Dhabi, F1 expert Christian Danner and RTL data analyst Steffen Kosuch analyze the GP and McLaren’s near-fiasco.
Max Verstappen won the last race of the 2025 season in Abu Dhabi, but the Dutchman could no longer prevent Lando Norris from winning the world championship title. As first in qualifying, Verstappen maintained the lead at the start and controlled the race confidently. Only for reasons of strategy did he give up the lead in the middle third of the race, but at the finish he was again over twelve seconds ahead.
Oscar Piastri, Lando Norris’ second challenger in the hot three-way World Championship battle at the Yas Marina Circuit, also did his best. Starting from P3 and with the hard tires, he unexpectedly attacked and overtook his own teammate on the first lap. A tough but fair maneuver.
Norris prevents duels with Leclerc and Russell
Against Verstappen in the Red Bull, however, there was neither enough performance nor a longer first stint to launch an attack. Second place was the maximum for the young Australian in this race.
Meanwhile, Norris himself drove a very clever race. As second at the start, he avoided any risk in the duel with his teammate on the first lap – understandably.
Video: That’s why McLaren’s World Cup tactics were “dangerous”
The strategy was also clearly aimed at preventing Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari or George Russell in the Mercedes from becoming a spoilsport.
McLaren even took this so far that the team planned to send their World Cup aspirant into traffic at the first stop, but he still stayed ahead of Leclerc and Russell.
The fact that Norris later had to overtake Verstappen’s teammate Tsunoda, who defended himself aggressively and beyond the limit in his last Red Bull race, was probably also taken into account.
Hamilton’s somewhat conciliatory end to the season
Even when Leclerc changed tires a second time, McLaren reacted in the same way, minimized the risk and brought Norris in again shortly afterwards. The world title was never in danger in the final part of the race. To be on the safe side, Norris would also have had the joker so that Piastri could fall behind him via team order. But McLaren was certainly happy to be able to forego this unpopular measure. Ultimately, the new world champion NOR did everything right.
In the end, Charles Leclerc had to let go, but at least he was ahead of George Russell in P5 by more than 25 seconds.
Behind them, Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon achieved their maximum in sixth and seventh place, while Lewis Hamilton in the second Ferrari made a good catch-up from 16th on the grid and still finished eighth at the end of a truly plague-filled season.
Lance Stroll lost P9 to Nico Hülkenberg due to a five-second penalty, but at least secured the last point of the 2025 season.