Our pick of the standout performers and the biggest flops from the final qualifying session of F1 2025.
Winner - Max Verstappen (1st)
'Moral champion' is a horrible cliche and it maybe implies Verstappen has in some way been hideously wronged this year by whoever beats him to the title (if he is beaten).
It's nothing like that - he just had a relatively ropey Red Bull for too much of a year in which his actual driving has perhaps been even better than ever.
The way he stuck it on pole for the decider not only keeps him in the hunt, after McLaren's practice pace suggested things might be a lot tougher for Red Bull, but emphasises his claim to being 2025's most deserving champion regardless of the actual points outcome. - Matt Beer
Loser - Oscar Piastri (3rd)
Oscar Piastri’s title chances were already slim pre-weekend, but qualifying third, behind both Verstappen and Norris, has made them even slimmer.
And it’s surprising as after a slow start on Friday, Piastri made a strong recovery in the early stages of qualifying, topping Q1 with a statement lap that wasn’t matched until Verstappen’s first lap of Q3.
Instead, Piastri says being a smidge behind Norris and two tenths adrift of Verstappen was more or less all that was in the car.
He was already going into Sunday needing a miracle, but now he essenitally needs Verstappen and Norris to properly trip over each other in front of him to have any hope of the crown. - Josh Suttill
Winner - Lando Norris (2nd)
Norris looked at slight unease in the aftermath of qualifying, as he would have hoped to control this race from the front. But in avoiding misfortune in Q1 and Q2, and putting in a good Q3 lap, he's taken three important steps towards taking a title that just needs a normal weekend from him.
It's not even totally clear that it's better to be first ahead of your famously opportunistic title rival in Verstappen than second behind him, and Norris will probably appreciate having the inside line into the first corner - so being more protected from any bowling-style mishaps further down the order.
Mind you, Piastri was second on the grid last year and was looped around at Turn 1, but here it's Piastri right behind Norris - and he can be trusted to keep things within reason.
This wasn't a best-case scenario qualifying from Norris - but it was closer to that than the worst-case scenario. - Valentin Khorounzhiy
Loser - Lewis Hamilton (16th)
It's been four successive qualifyings now - three grand prix qualifyings, one sprint qualifying - that Hamilton has failed to advance from the opening segment, a fact he faced with the following answer: "I don't have the words to express how I feel. Just a lot of anger."
That Ferrari has clearly taken a big step backwards and is limping across the line this year doesn't help, but there's a big contrast between the two SF25s right now. Leclerc has wrangled his way into Q3 still each of these four times, but Hamilton is coming up empty.
He should be worried about the evolution of the gap through the season - with a mid-season patch of relative parity making way for a three-tenths buffer he now needs to overcome to get back on terms with his team-mate. - VK
Winner - Fernando Alonso (6th)
This was a fitting coda in a season of consistent qualifying excellence for Alonso, whose 29-1 score over team-mate Lance Stroll in the qualifying head-to-head in 2025 was achieved with the same machine-like dependability with which he had dominated Stoffel Vandoorne at McLaren a decade ago, or some of his unfortunate Renault/Minardi team-mates prior.
At 44, Alonso continues to defy trends and conventional performance wisdom. Though F1 market forces have not played out that way, it would have been cool to see him benchmarked against a Verstappen or a Leclerc in the same machinery. - VK
Winner - Esteban Ocon (8th)
Team-mate Ollie Bearman had gone on a big qualifying run against Ocon in recent months, and while this doesn't undo it, it at the very least creates some positive momentum to carry into the winter.
It was a big turnaround after a "lowest point" Friday, after which Haas "changed a lot of things on the car, all the parametres, the ones that you would not even think of, really" and Ocon suddenly felt in control again.
He admitted the sheer scope of that turnaround, and the underlying mechanism behind it, is a massive mystery - but you'd rather be surprised to be fast than foresee being slow. - VK
Loser - Kimi Antonelli (14th)
Antonelli's rookie season hasn't been that bad. If it had, Mercedes wouldn't be on the cusp of sealing second in the constructors' championship. Yes, it's had plenty of pace slumps and missteps, but what did you really expect from a teenage rookie who was only two years out of Formula 4 when he landed on the grid?
And he has had a few real highs, headlined by that Miami sprint pole.
With all that said, here at the finale there's Gabriel Bortoleto seventh on the grid in a Sauber for the final race of his rookie season. There's Isack Hadjar saying goodbye to Racing Bulls having thoroughly earned his Red Bull chance. This wasn't Ollie Bearman's greatest day but his Haas is still three places ahead of Antonelli's Mercedes on the grid.
Antonelli cited weird tyre performance for being 14th, 0.350 seconds off team-mate Russell's pacesetting Q2 lap. Lots of drivers found the tyre/track behaviour odd across Q1 to Q2 though and still made Q3.
If Mercedes takes the leap forward it plans to in 2026, Antonelli has to prove days like this are rookie blips. - MB
Winner - Gabriel Bortoleto (7th)
After a string of six straight grand prix qualifying defeats to Sauber team-mate Nico Hulkenberg, Gabriel Bortoleto turned the tables and earned his first Q3 appearance since Monza.
It stopped a properly shaky end to Bortoleto’s season as he only came up 0.002s short of outqualifying his mentor, Fernando Alonso, and winning the Class B fight.
Crucially, Bortoleto also qualified ahead of Ocon’s Haas, the team Sauber sits five points behind in the constructors’ championship.
It means Bortoleto has a decent chance of helping the Sauber name go out of F1 on a high on Sunday after 32 years. - JS
Loser - Alpine (19th and 20th)
In one of the closest qualifying sessions of the season, there was a clear weakest team in Alpine, which chalked up plenty of deleted laptimes in Q1 as Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto tried everything they could to escape Q1.
Instead, for the very first time this year, Alpine’s drivers qualified as the two slowest drivers in a grand prix qualifying session.
Colapinto’s end-of-season slump continued as he ended up four tenths slower than Gasly - larger than the deficit 19th place Gasly had to fourth place. - JS
Loser - Nico Hulkenberg (18th)
“We just tanked it ourselves” was Hulkenberg’s verdict after his first Q1 exit since Baku - 18th being the worst qualifying result of the second half of his season.
Sauber left his run late in Q1 meaning he did encounter plenty of traffic on his crucial lap, including two cars at Turn 6 that were “pretty disturbing”.
Hulkenberg didn’t feel it had cost him much, but given the margins are so tight (Bortoleto got through in the other Sauber despite being just 0.076s quicker) it was enough to knock Hulkenberg out. - JS
