Qatar GP 2025: McLaren’s Norris and Piastri vs Verstappen
It was an almost perfect result for F1 as a sport, if not for McLaren.
This is the first championship decider between more than two drivers since 2010. The pressure is intense and the excitement will accompany it.
Norris was downplaying it when asked on Sunday how he would approach the final race and what could be his first F1 title.
“It’s the same as every weekend,” he said. “I’m trying to beat them, they’re trying to beat me. There’s nothing different. I just want to go to bed.”
Piastri was trying to keep the disappointment of losing the lead in perspective after a strong weekend that followed a series of tough races that saw him lose what looked like a 34-point championship lead at the end of August.
“This is definitely not a disaster,” he said. “We made the wrong decision today. It’s obvious, but it’s not the end of the world.
“So it hurts right now, but things will get better with time. “There have been a lot of difficult moments this year and previous seasons, and I feel like you always get stronger in some of those moments.
“But it all depends on how you handle it. So I’m confident we’ll get through it. But yeah, obviously it hurts right now.”
Verstappen, who won the championship for the fifth time in a row, is enjoying winning a championship that he spent most of the year thinking was unattainable.
“I know I’m 12 points behind,” he said. “I just go in there with positive energy. I try everything I can.
“But at the same time, I know that if I don’t win, I still have a great season. So it doesn’t matter. It takes a lot of the pressure off me. I’m just having a good time out there, like today.”
Where the problems will be most intense is at McLaren. And their bosses know what’s at stake.
Stella has been here before. It showed in the two years that the driver who finished third in this type of scenario won the championship. He took part in both.
In 2007, while Stella was racing engineer for Kimi Raikkonen at Ferrari, the Finn overhauled a huge points lead to beat McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton and Alonso in the final two races.
In 2010, Ferrari was working as Alonso’s engineer when things got complicated in Abu Dhabi.
Stella also worked with Michael Schumacher starting in 2002; The German was in the midst of a streak of winning five consecutive drivers’ championships – but only after the German had agonizingly lost three in 1997, ’98 and ’99.
“Racing is hard,” Stella said. “Races can teach you hard lessons, but this is the history of champions. I worked with Michael Schumacher. We won many championships together.”
“We’re all thinking about championships now, but after Vegas I was thinking about how much pain Michael had to go through when he started his experience at Ferrari.
“This is just the history of Formula 1. This is the true nature of racing.”
“We are disappointed, but once we start reviewing we will be even more determined to learn from our lessons, adapt and come out stronger as a team.
“And we want to make the most of it, to be sure that this extraordinary, beautiful opportunity that we have to compete for the drivers’ championship will really stop Verstappen’s dominance in this era of Formula 1.”
