🔗 Share this article

Verstappen benefited from a tactical decision from McLaren that contradicted decisions made by every other team during an initial safety car deployment

It was a costly decision that gave up track position to the Red Bull driver in the final stages and retrospectively cost the race win for the Australian driver

Grand Prix Results and Championship Consequences

Verstappen won to take his seventh win of the season, matching Norris and Piastri, while the Australian was runner-up and the British driver fourth behind the Williams car of the Spanish driver

Norris won himself an additional points by passing the Mercedes driver's Mercedes on the penultimate lap

The championship leader has been left with a twelve point lead over his rival, who moved ahead of his teammate by four points heading to the final race on December 5-7

To secure the title, the British driver must finish at least third at Yas Marina if his rival wins the race next race day

Critical Moments of the Dramatic Grand Prix

• The team's choice not to pit when a safety car was called on the seventh lap for a collision between the French team's Gasly and Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg
• A strategy initiated by the Australian to bring forward his final stop in a last-ditch effort to challenge Verstappen came to nothing
• A unexpected second podium for the Williams driver handed by McLaren's strategy call

The Way McLaren Missed Out in Qatar

The fateful moment for the team was when Gasly and Hulkenberg came together as the German tried to overtake the Frenchman around the outside of Turn One on lap seven

The German's car was left damaged beside the circuit That brought out the safety car

The critical part of the timing was that it meant there were 50 laps left in the race

With the tire manufacturer imposing a twenty-five lap maximum usage on the tires, that meant anyone who pitted at that time was locked into a fixed plan with a additional pit stop on the thirty-second lap

Driver Reactions and After the Event Comments

No words

The McLaren driver commented in his after-race interview: Clearly we didn't get it right tonight My driving was the best race I was capable of, as fast as I could, but there was nothing left out there Tried my best but couldn't secure victory

The race winner said: This was an amazing performance for us We made the correct decision to pit That proved smart And super-happy to triumph in Qatar and remain competitive to the head, remarkable

Final Grand Prix Positions

• 1. Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing)
• 2. Piastri (McLaren Racing)
• 3. Sainz (Williams Racing)
• 4. Lando Norris (McLaren Racing)
• 5. Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes)
• 6. George Russell (Mercedes-AMG)
• 7. Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin)
• 8. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari)
• 9. Liam Lawson (Racing Bulls)
• 10. Tsunoda (Red Bull Racing)

Looking Ahead

The all-important championship finale at the Yas Marina The circuit itself does not create the most thrilling competition, but yet again this evening event features an contest which appears set to become every bit as dramatic as Vettel's maiden championship in 2010, or Verstappen's much-debated first title in twenty-twenty-one