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Formula 1's Qatar Grand Prix sprint was not so heavy on position changes - yet somehow produced close to a full race's worth of memorable moments.
From the excellently executed Charles Leclerc/Lewis Hamilton tussle and Franco Colapinto having to pull off a rare pit exit overtake, to Oscar Piastri dipping in and out of Lando Norris's DRS and then being waved past in relatively dramatic fashion, there was a lot going on for a 19-lap event.
Here are our winners and losers from the third-to-last F1 race of the 2024 season.
Winner: Lando Norris
Will Norris's late-race act of magnanimousness win him much in the long-term? Probably not; Piastri didn't look particularly enthused about being given a sprint win, and McLaren might be quietly irritated about Norris ignoring a direct plea to keep position and subjecting the 1-2 to an added risk, however slight it was.
But as far as a performance of total control goes, this was a credible one - you can't really execute an F1 race much more convincingly than, when having the race already won, proving yourself able to protect your team-mate behind by giving him DRS at will and then giving them the win as a last-moment act of charity.
If it really was this comfortable, Sunday's looking good.
Loser: George Russell
Sunday's also looking good for Russell, whose pace in the Mercedes seemed to hold up quite well, given how quickly he was able to re-engage with Piastri the moment the McLaren driver lost the insurance of Norris's DRS.
Russell will probably feel annoyed at losing out to Piastri's Turn 1 move, and it's that move that consigns him to the loser category here, but it does also keep the suspense up.
On the evidence of the weekend so far, he's the only driver who has a real shot at Norris here - we haven't got to see a true fight between him and his compatriot, but the clues from the sprint seem promising enough, even if the end result underwhelmed.
Winner: McLaren
A 30-point buffer coming out of the sprint means McLaren could very well end the weekend with the constructors' championship - a 1-2 would be enough without one of the two Ferraris hitting serious misfortune.
There's a chance this title fight will go to Abu Dhabi, but this was more like holding serve while already up in the set. It would now take something truly dramatic for McLaren to miss out.
Loser: Max Verstappen
The RB20 looked pretty ludicrous to drive during that first lap in which Verstappen fell behind a Mercedes, a Haas and then an Alpine.
"You could see he just couldn't fire up the tyres. By the time the tyres did get going, the front pack was gone," Red Bull team principal Christian Horner explained to Sky Sports F1.
Now that 2024 is done and dusted, all his thoughts will be towards the 2025 title defence, and Qatar must look alarming in that regard. The high-speed corners are all here for Red Bull to feast on, but it is not feasting enough - it looked meek in qualifying and Verstappen struggled to make meaningful progress in the sprint.
"I was just sliding everywhere, having a lot of moments, very weird moments, weird snaps," said Verstappen. "Honestly, that is just what's happening all weekend already - no balance on entry, no balance mid-corner, everything is just the extreme version."
Would he have made a bigger run at Hulkenberg if the stakes were higher here? Potentially, but the fact Red Bull got beaten by the Haas in a straight fight will not be lost on its champion.
"We've got a bit of a mountain to climb," Horner admitted.
Winner: Haas
A three-point buffer over Alpine is still not comfortable, but Haas will love what it saw from Hulkenberg and the VF-24 in the sprint.
Norris's pace was obviously constrained out front, but Hulkenberg finished 8.5 seconds off after 19 laps - while ending up six seconds clear of Pierre Gasly.
Team-mate Kevin Magnussen, who made up five positions to go from 15th to 10th, backed up the conclusion that the Haas might just be in a very good position in the grand prix too.
Good enough, potentially, to put sixth in the constructors' out of reach or close enough for Abu Dhabi with a well-executed grand prix qualifying and race.
Losers: Red Bull's second seat contenders
It was through a variety of circumstances, of course, but it was very funny to see the four nominal contenders for the Red Bull seat next to Verstappen for 2025 - Liam Lawson, Yuki Tsunoda, Franco Colapinto and Sergio Perez - run 17th to 20th at one point in the race.
Tsunoda's sprint was over in qualifying. Lawson's unravelled with an off-track trip at the start. Their RB team is now in quite dire straits as far as the constructors' fight for sixth is concerned.
Perez and Colapinto didn't have much to fight for starting from pitlane - but the former still managed to come out of the sprint with a bit of a sour taste by getting overtaken on pit exit.
Horner sounded baffled by Perez's delay when discussing it with Sky and, while he initially seemed quite gentle with his words, he ended his assessment with the following: "When the light goes out, you're supposed to go."
Perez not going made no material difference to Red Bull's points tally - but it's clear his bosses' frustration is compounding with almost every session.
