(Image via Forbes)
Volunteer Writer: Mariana Peñafiel Ide
Email: mpenafiel@umassd.edu
With three races and one sprint remaining in the 2025 Formula 1 championship, the world title remains undecided.
Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, and Max Verstappen remain the three contenders for the 2025 championship.
After the São Paulo Grand Prix on Sunday, November 9, which featured safety cars, accidents, incredible battles, and a few abandonments, the championship picture is clearer in some ways. But the path to the title has become more complicated, especially for Max Verstappen.
On Sunday at Interlagos, Lando Norris dominated both the Grand Prix and the sprint race, scoring the maximum points available this weekend. With 25 points for winning Sunday’s Grand Prix and 8 points for Saturday’s sprint race, the British driver now leads the championship with 390 points.
He is followed by his teammate Oscar Piastri, who, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, led the championship for 189 days until Norris’ victory in Mexico dropped him to second place. Now, with a 24-point gap, Piastri remains a strong contender for the world title—but maybe not entirely in the way he was hoping.
And of course, we can’t forget about four-time world champion Max Verstappen, who, after one of his most difficult seasons, managed to secure third place in the championship with 341 points.
This came after his incredible race at Interlagos, where he fought his way back from the pit lane to finish third behind Kimi Antonelli.
With only three Grands Prix and one Sprint left, there are 83 points still up for grabs, and everyone is wondering: can Max still win and secure his fifth championship?
If you ask Max, his answer would be simple: “Forget about it”.
“No, not the way things are going right now. That’s just the way it is. It’s clear,” Verstappen said when asked whether he could still win the championship under normal circumstances.
Ironically, although Max himself seems to have already accepted the likely outcome, many of his fans have not yet ruled out the possibility of the Dutch driver winning the championship. For them, as long as the numbers allow it, the fight is still on.
Well, let’s do some math.
How the Standings are looking after the Brazilian GP:
- Lando Norris: 390
- Oscar Piastri: 366
- Max Verstappen: 341
Verstappen is 49 points behind Norris and 25 points behind Oscar. This leaves only 83 points remaining.
So, if Max wins Vegas, Qatar (+sprint), and Abu Dhabi, he would end this season with 424 points.
MV: 341 + 83 = 424
If this happens and Max does win every single race remaining, in order for him to win the championship, Lando couldn’t score more than 34 points, and Oscar couldn’t score more than 58 points for the remainder of the season.
LN: 390 + up to 34 = 424 maximum
OP: 366 + up to 58 = 424 maximum
This way, both McLaren drivers could only tie with Max in 424 points. The four times world champion would win on countback, having won 8 races (the five he has already won and the three he would hypothetically win in this scenario) versus the 7 victories of Norris and Piastri.
But this is extremely unlikely.
Not just because a tie has never happened in the history of Formula 1, but also because for Lando to make less than 34 points, he would have to have really bad results in the following races. This is highly unlikely given his consistent performance so far.
But it could still happen. If Lando has a DNF or just doesn’t secure a point in any of the races, he would finish 3rd or lower in the other two, earning just a maximum of 30 points. If in the sprint he does not finish higher than 5th, he would end the championship with 424 points. And just like that, both drivers tie, and Max wins on countback.
But what happens with Oscar?
The other McLaren driver is still a threat and one who shouldn’t underestimated.
If the Australian driver gets 2nd place behind Verstappen in the 3 races left, he would end with 420 points, which means that in the Qatar sprint, he should finish 5th or lower. In this scenario, just like Norris, he would tie with Max, and Verstappen would win on victories.
So, can Max Verstappen still win this 2025 championship? Technically, yes. Realistically, he would have to pull a miracle.
Verstappen doesn’t just depend on himself anymore—he depends on McLaren making big mistakes. In other words, even if Verstappen is perfect, he still needs McLaren’s drivers to fail.
If Max doesn’t win this championship, it would not diminish how close he got while having a considerably worse car than Norris and Piastri.
As reported by Motorsport, Paul Monaghan, Red Bull chief engineer, mentioned,“This year’s challenged him in a different way, I think, because we’ve not presented him with a car that was necessarily quick enough at all the events.”
We can imagine and dream as much as we want. We can hold onto the last hopes, but still the future remains unwritten.
Because if there’s one thing Formula 1 has taught us, it’s that anything can happen.
Even miracles.All statistics, point totals, and scenario projections were based on the official F1 drivers’ standings and F1 championship calculator.