Winners and losers from the 2025 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (Yas Marina)

Lando Norris tops PlanetF1.com’s list of Winners from Abu Dhabi, but who else stood out or dropped the ball at Yas Marina?

Here is PlanetF1.com’s full list of winners and losers from the 2025 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Winners and losers from the 2025 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Grand Prix

Winner: Lando Norris

Lando Norris has come in for considerable flak over the years. Whether that be for costly driver errors, fumbles under pressure, or foot-in-mouth moments in press conferences, the British driver has been one of the foremost drivers in the question mark column. Excellent, but exceptional? Talented, but elite? Gift, but a World Champion?

What the last few months have illustrated is that Norris has truly learned from some of the stumbles along his path, as he has delivered when it mattered to secure his maiden Drivers’ Championship.

Given the 12-point lead he enjoyed coming into the weekend, a top-three finish in the car that wrapped up the Constructors’ Championship weeks ago was always more likely than not at a venue without much risk of variables such as rain adding complications to the mix.

Norris only needed to worry about beating everyone apart from his title rivals, and that’s exactly what he did. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t take risks along the way.

His cutting through the pack of slower cars after his pitstop was hugely decisive, with no signs of any tentativeness when he approached the back of potentially disruptive cars such as Liam Lawson or Yuki Tsunoda.

Indeed, Norris gave Tsunoda little chance to hold him up at all, making a daring move to pass the second Red Bull that, despite being off-track, was legitimised by Tsunoda’s pre-emptive weaving.

Finally free of the burden of the pressure of trying to step out from the shadow of Verstappen, Norris could finally let the emotions run wild after the chequered flag.

Having always been transparent about wanting to succeed without sacrificing his personality, given his own acknowledgement about being a more sensitive character than Verstappen, the full extent of his feelings of vindication ran wild in the aftermath.

“I certainly feel like at moments I’ve driven better than I feel like other people can,” he said, addressing the topic of whether he believes he’s better than his Dutch peer, a driver Norris has often expressed open admiration of as being perhaps the greatest F1 has ever seen.

“And I feel like I drove at a level I don’t think other people can match. But have I also made my mistakes? Have I made more mistakes than other people at times? Yes.

“Is there stuff Max could do better at times than me? Yes. Do I believe he’s unbeatable? No. But you also don’t know, do you? It’s hard to know.

“Max drove like he is a four-time world champion. And I’m very happy that I got to race against him and try to prove myself against him. Whether then you want to write whatever you want to write, against him, against me, or whatever it is, feel free.

“But I’m not here, my motivation is not here to prove I’m better than someone else. That’s not what makes me happy. I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and go, ‘I’m so happy because I beat Max.’ I honestly, deep down, don’t care about that.

“I don’t care if every article is, “Do you think he’s better than me?” or “Oscar’s better,” or whatever it is. Doesn’t matter. I have no interest in that. I’ve just done what I’ve needed to do to win the world championship. That’s it. And I made my people happy.

“That’s all I really care about at the end of the day. I’m not going to wake up happy tomorrow because I can just go and say to myself, ‘I’m world champion.’ It might make me smile, but it’s not gonna be the truth.

“It’s gonna be, “My mom’s happy. My dad’s happy. My sisters are happy. My brother’s happy. My friends are happy.” And that’s all I need in my life.”

And Norris is exactly right not to care. The British driver might not have the final percent or two that delineates Verstappen into the category of the likes of Michael Schumacher, Ayrton Senna, and Lewis Hamilton, but he has utilised the tools available to him to maximise his season, deliver at a more consistently strong level than his teammate, and rise to the occasion as required when it mattered.

It was a Nico Rosberg 2016-esque delivery of a title, having worked diligently and fervently to address his own weaknesses and deliver upon his potential, and it’s been enough.

Will some questions remain? Of course. Given the advantage McLaren did have for most of the season, the fact Verstappen was ever even allowed back into the picture, and finishing just two points off, underlines just how close it all came to slipping away at the very end.

But Norris has shown marked improvement year on year, to the point where he is World Champion material. The fact that Verstappen may have that tiny smidge more ultimate potential takes nothing away from that fact and, if anything, only makes Norris’ achievement all the more special.

Loser: Yuki Tsunoda

Tsunoda may have set out with the best of intentions to help his Red Bull teammate secure the championship, but the Japanese driver proved unable to make much of an impact in that regard.

Equipped with the hard tyres for a long first stint, the expected strategy of getting Tsunoda in front of Norris through the pit sequence did work for Red Bull and, with Norris approaching the back of Tsunoda, he received the order to try doing his best to compromise the McLaren man.

Sergio Perez, four years ago, earned himself immense favour at Red Bull by driving “like an animal” to hinder Lewis Hamilton’s race in the tense 2021 title decider, having driven (intentionally) with the caution of a vision-impaired pensioner through the twisty stuff at Yas Marina, before exhausting his battery energy down the straights to severely compromise the Mercedes man.

How would Tsunoda compare against that effort? The entire purpose of his race came into focus on Lap 24 as he radioed back that he “knew what to do” only to prove, moments later, that he, in fact, did not.

Norris got into DRS range and attacked down the first half of the back straight, and Tsunoda clumsily moved across in response to the British driver’s direction change. It pushed Norris off the track but his reactionary move meant that Norris’ off-track pass was legitimised and, indeed, the stewards were clear in how unimpressed they were.

While Perez’s defence was perfectly judged to remain on the right side of the rules, Tsunoda’s clearly immediately overstepped the mark having been unable to hinder Norris earlier in order to head off the possibility of being vulnerable down the straight.

“[Norris] was making an overtaking move on [Tsunoda],” read the verdict.

“[Tsunoda] made a number of changes of direction which ultimately resulted in [Norris] having to go off track to avoid a collision. In doing so, [he] also effectively forced [Norris] off the track.”

Despite the egregiousness of the move, Tsunoda questioned the harshness of the penalty over the radio.

While Tsunoda can be commended for his willingness to try helping, showcasing his professionalism towards his role at Red Bull after receiving news of his demotion during the week, the execution of his attempt left much to be desired.

Winner: Max Verstappen

Verstappen gave the Abu Dhabi finale everything he had, coming out a comfortable winner in a controlled display of speed and management, to the point where victory appeared inevitable once he’d secured pole position.

The expectation of being able to toy with his rivals was neutered by McLaren’s clever strategy split, leaving Verstappen in the position of just having to get on with things, win the race, and hope that fortune would smile upon him.

That moment never came, but the disappointment of defeat was handled with grace and dignity as Verstappen spoke of his pride in his team, the people around him, and the performance of Norris and McLaren.

It’s often said that a person’s real character shines through in defeat and adversity, and Verstappen underlined his strength of character in how he handled Norris wresting the crown away from him after four consecutive years, and having had an increasing strength dangle the prospect of a fifth in front of him.

Under the immense pressure of the weekend, Verstappen delivered at the top of his game, beating his championship rivals with relative ease as neither appeared to have much of an answer for his speed.

Verstappen may have been beaten to the title, but he has not been defeated.

Loser: Lewis Hamilton

It’s indicative of just how much expectations have slipped for Lewis Hamilton that a recovery to eighth-place wasn’t actually a terrible result for the seven-time F1 World Champion.

While both utilised a two-stop strategy, Hamilton’s differed in that he was one of three to start on the soft tyre, and he made good use of an aggressive strategy to slice his way forward by eight positions during the Grand Prix.

But Hamilton remained hugely overshadowed by what Charles Leclerc did in the other Ferrari, with the Monegasque driver starting from fifth on the medium tyre and getting ahead of George Russell to apply serious pressure on Lando Norris throughout, a fact acknowledged by Verstappen post-race as Leclerc “driving his heart out”.

The end of Hamilton’s grace season has been reached and, while there have been indications of some behind-the-scenes disquiet, those voices aren’t particularly loud.

If the disparity between Leclerc and Hamilton continues on into 2026, under brand-new regulations, don’t expect those voices to remain so subdued.

More from the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix via PlanetF1.com

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Winner: Fernando Alonso

The two-time F1 World Champion might only be a few weeks shy of being 25 years in Formula 1, but the Spaniard continues to showcase why he remains deserving of his position on the grid.

There’s no doubt that the Aston Martin AMR25 is a distinctly midfield car, but Alonso followed up his seventh-place in Qatar with an even better sixth-place finish at Yas Marina.

Even better, this happened in a straightforward race with no interruptions or extenuating circumstances, and with zero retirements.

The two strong points finishes to end the season have proven enough to keep Haas behind in the Constructors’ Championship, although Racing Bulls ended up finishing three points clear.

“Our race pace hasn’t always matched our qualifying recently,” Alonso said, having said the top 10 would be a struggle after qualifying eighth in Qatar.

“A solid Sunday here feels very good, and it is great to finish the season with a strong P6”.

A final year of treading water ahead of the great revolution of 2026 is over. How will Lawrence Stroll’s team, under Adrian Newey’s stewardship, fare under the new rules?

Loser: Racing Bulls

With Isack Hadjar having qualified ninth for the season finale, the French driver was pleased at having maximised the result he felt capable of in the VCARB02.

But Sunday proved very difficult for Hadjar, who went backwards in a “tough” race in which he explained afterwards as being down to a fundamental lack of pace after using a similar one-stop strategy to most of the leading cars.

Finishing 17th, it was an unusually low-key race for Hadjar, while Liam Lawson ran longer in the first stint from 13th on the grid, ultimately ending in 18th.

Lawson gave it his best to help Red Bull with some fight in him when Lando Norris came up behind him after the McLaren driver’s stop, faring slightly better than what Tsunoda managed but, ultimately, there was an uncharacteristic lack of mark left by the Racing Bulls in the final race of the season.

Fortunately for the Faenza-based squad, its lead over Aston Martin proved sufficient to secure sixth in the Constructors’ Championship, but it was a closer finish than might have been anticipated just a week ago given Racing Bulls’ pace in Qatar.

Read next: The cunning McLaren strategy that cornered Red Bull and delivered Norris the title