Championship Battle
The lively 2025 Formula One season saw the first three-way championship fight at the final race since 2010. Coming out on top of the World Drivers’ Championship was McLaren Formula 1 Team’s Lando Norris, the British driver securing his maiden title in the seventh year of his career. Max Verstappen, the Dutch four-time world champion of Oracle Red Bull Racing (Red Bull), placed second in the championship, losing his streak and his right to race under number one next year. Oscar Piastri landed third, an impressive result for the Australian McLaren driver’s third year in F1. But how did they get there?
From the beginning of the season, McLaren dominated almost every weekend. Norris took the championship lead by placing P1 in the Australian Grand Prix in March, the first race of the year. However, his teammate Piastri narrowed the gap over the next few races, taking the lead at Saudi Arabia in April. Piastri held this position tightly for the next 189 days, as the team continued to bring home 1-2 finishes and prove the superiority of their car. This trend continued throughout the first half of the season, with McLaren winning 11 out of 14 races before the summer break in August. At this point, it was assumed that the title fight would be a competition between the two teammates.
However, following this three-week pause, things began to change. On the first weekend back, Norris did not finish (DNF) at the Dutch Grand Prix, and Piastri did the same two races later in Azerbaijan. After this pivotal moment, Piastri began to struggle as his teammate slowly chipped away at his lead. Rumors of favoritism within the team grew as Piastri did not win another race the entire season, and Norris eventually reclaimed top position at the Mexican Grand Prix in late October. Although it seemed like the season was going exceptionally well for McLaren as they clinched an early World Constructors’ Championship at Singapore in October, a new competitor was entering contention: the reigning champion Max Verstappen. During the break, Red Bull improved their car and Verstappen began to close in on the two McLarens, winning six races in the second half of the season.
The drama between these drivers reached new heights in the final three races. In Las Vegas, Verstappen led a flawless race to a P1 finish as McLaren faced the unthinkable. With their drivers one and two in the championship and only a few more races left in the year, they were hit with a double disqualification. Both Norris and Piastri were awarded zero points as their skid blocks, a part on the underside of the car, were excessively worn, indicating they had been too low to the ground. This crucial mistake brought Verstappen even closer, as he once again finished P1 in Qatar, taking Piastri’s second position in the championship as a result of poor strategy from the McLaren team. Although Verstappen had been 100 points behind the leader earlier in the season, he went into the final race a mere 12 points behind Norris, with Piastri only four points lower. Tensions rose as any of these three drivers could claim the championship at Abu Dhabi on Sunday, Dec. 7, but all Norris had to do to secure his win was get on the podium. Verstappen qualified P1, Norris P2, and Piastri P3, all starting on the front row of the grid. In the first lap, Piastri overtook Norris. These positions remained the same for the rest of the race as Verstappen came home first, Piastri second, and Norris third. This podium finish was sufficient to provide Norris with his first championship title, beating Verstappen by only two points and ending his four-season winning streak.
Memorable Moments
The excitement of the 2025 season extended beyond this thrilling championship fight with many memorable moments from the other eight teams on the grid. One of the most unforgettable events of the season occurred at the British Grand Prix in July, when veteran driver Nico Hulkenberg earned his first podium of his fifteen-year career in his 239th race, the record for the most races without a podium in F1 history. Starting from 19th on the grid at Silverstone for Stake F1 Team Kick Sauber, he was able to push his way to third through good strategy decisions and precise driving among changing weather conditions. This heartwarming success was also the first podium for the Sauber team in 13 years. It was so unexpected that Mercedes and Aston Martin had to supply the champagne for his podium celebration.
However, some teams did not live up to expectations. Scuderia Ferrari HP struggled throughout the entire season with consistent complaints about car performance from both drivers Charles Leclerc and seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton. This rough season included three zero-point weekends for the team. The first occurred at the Chinese Grand Prix in March where the drivers were disqualified post-race for separate technical mistakes. Leclerc’s car was one kilogram below the minimum weight limit of 800 kg, and the skid block of Hamilton’s car was overworn. The next incident took place at the Dutch Grand Prix in August, with both Leclerc and Hamilton crashing out of the race. Hamilton spun off the wet track into the barriers, and Leclerc later collided with Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team. The last double DNF took place in November at the São Paulo Grand Prix as Piastri hit Antonelli into Leclerc and Hamilton was involved in multiple collisions that eventually forced him to retire his car. These incidents, along with a historically tough season for Ferrari, resulted in the team’s fourth place finish in the World Constructors’ Championship. Leclerc earned seven podiums while Hamilton earned none during his first season with the team. They did not win any grand prixes in 2025, leaving Carlos Sainz Jr. as the last driver to place first in a race with Ferrari, earning P1 at the 2024 Mexican GP.
In 2025, Sainz moved from Ferrari to Atlassian Williams Racing, where he has already earned two podiums. At the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, he started P2 and finished P3, achieving the first podium for Williams since 2021, and their first podium for a full-length race since 2017. This was an unexpected moment as Sainz himself did not believe he would obtain a podium in his first year after leaving Ferrari, especially considering he had four DNFs this season. His podium at the Qatar Grand Prix was even more surprising as he qualified P7, pushing his way up to P3 as a result of a strong start and solid strategy calls from his team. These podiums, along with his teammate Alex Albon’s consistent point scoring (he actually finished above Sainz in the driver standings), pulled Williams up to fifth in the World Constructors’ Championship and signaled a strong start for Sainz with his new team.
Rookie Season
2025 was the debut season for six rookies for the first time since 2010. At the start of the season, this included Antonelli for Mercedes, Oliver Bearman for MoneyGram Haas F1 Team, Isack Hadjar for Visa Cash App Racing Bulls F1 Team, Gabriel Bortoleto for Sauber, Jack Doohan for BWT Alpine F1 Team, and Liam Lawson for Red Bull. However, these positions did not stay the same as teams switched and dropped drivers early on in the season. After only two races, Liam Lawson was swapped from Red Bull’s senior team, Red Bull Racing, to their sister team, Racing Bulls, after crashing out of the Australian Grand Prix and placing 12th in the Chinese Grand Prix. This controversial move did not give Lawson much time to adjust to the car, but the team decided Yuki Tsunoda, who had been driving for Racing Bulls, would be a better fit. Six races into the season, Jack Doohan faced an even worse fate. Having scored zero points in these early grand prixes, he was replaced by Alpine’s reserve driver, another rookie, Franco Colapinto. The team stated this would be a five-race trial, but Doohan was never brought back and lost his F1 seat entirely, even though Colapinto also did not earn any points this season.
While their first season did not go according to plan for these drivers, two of the 2025 rookies earned podiums. At the Dutch Grand Prix, Hadjar of Racing Bulls began in 4th and finished 3rd, achieving his first podium in his 15th race, a promising start to his Formula 1 career. Antonelli, who had the rare opportunity of driving for Mercedes as a rookie, gained three podiums. His first took place at the Canadian Grand Prix where he qualified P4 and overtook Piastri on the first lap, resulting in a double podium for Mercedes as his teammate, George Russell, won the race. At 18 years old, before he even graduated high school, Antonelli became the third-youngest driver to make it to the podium in F1. In São Paulo, he earned his best result yet, starting and finishing P2 after making it through a lap one collision and defending against Verstappen. His last podium occurred in Vegas, although he did not get to take part in the celebration. He began the grand prix in 17th and made an impressive push to P4, even with a five-second penalty for a false start. Although he finished the race in 4th, still a shocking result given the conditions, Norris’ disqualification bumped Antonelli up to 3rd.
2026 Changes
Compared to 2025, there will be relatively few new faces on the grid next year. The only driver to completely lose a spot in Formula 1 at the conclusion of this season is Yuki Tsunoda. After a five-year career, the Japanese driver is the most recent victim of the second Red Bull seat, a position notorious for frequent swaps as it is difficult to compete with Verstappen in a car tailored to his driving style. Hadjar of Racing Bulls will take his spot, moving on to a top team, but inheriting the turbulent role of Verstappen’s teammate. This leaves his seat at Racing Bulls open for the British rookie Arvid Lindblad to move up from Formula Two and make his debut in 2026.
There will also be major changes in the teams on the grid. Audi is buying complete ownership of Sauber, replacing it with the new Audi F1 Team and developing their own power unit. They will retain the same driver lineup as this year, consisting of Hülkenberg and Bortoleto. There will also be an 11th team joining the grid for the first time since 2016. The Cadillac Formula 1 Team will enter the scene, planning to use a Ferrari power unit for the first few years before developing their own in collaboration with General Motors. This new addition will bring back two fan-favorite F1 veterans who lost their seats at the end of 2024: Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas who raced from 2012–2024 and Mexican driver Sergio “Checo” Perez who competed 2011–2024. As a result, there will be a total of 22 cars on the grid next year.
Along with these shifts in team lineups, new technical regulations will result in major changes to the cars themselves. They will be smaller, lighter, and the front wings will be significantly narrower. They will have new power units with a 50/50 split between internal combustion engines and electric power, utilizing 100% sustainable fuel. 2026 will also see the death of the drag reduction system (DRS) that opens a flap on the rear wing to increase speed. This will be replaced by active aerodynamics in which both the front and rear wings can be opened (Z-Mode) to increase cornering grip or closed (X-Mode) to reduce drag and increase speed on the straights. Manual Override Mode (MOM) will also be introduced, providing drivers with temporary bursts of electrical power. Similar to DRS, MOM will only be activated when the driver is within one second of the car ahead. These changes are intended to increase overtakes and straight-line speeds, adding to the anticipation of the 2026 season.
Adrian Peoples can be reached at apeoples@wesleyan.edu.
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