Title contenders reveal their true colours at Saudi GP

Oscar Piastri's triumph at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, his third success in 2025, not only lifted an Australian to the top of the drivers' standings for the first time since his manager Mark Webber back in 2010, but it also made his McLaren team the only one ever to score victories at 50 different venues.

- David Tremayne

But might we look back at the end of the year and see that this was also the race where the three title contenders inadvertently (or deliberately) revealed their true colours?

First, there was the blinding speed that Piastri and teammate Lando Norris showed on Friday and Saturday. Then the accident in which Norris made a small error which put his McLaren into the wall in the final qualifying session. The timing of the red flag that ensued had some serious repercussions for some of McLaren's rivals.

Piastri was super lucky that the fast lap he had been on was completed with only milliseconds to spare before the red flag was shown, so his lap time of 1min 27.560sec did count.

But Mercedes drivers George Russell and Kimi Antonelli, and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton, had to abandon fast laps and were thus left with tyres that had effectively been wasted, and time for just one more run.

The main beneficiary was Max Verstappen, who had struggled yet again with his Red Bull on Friday, but which, he said, "came alive in the night". He had only been warming up his tyres ready for a "push lap" next time round, when the session was halted.