2025 F1 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix: Key takeaways as Oscar Piastri wins again

Al Arabiya

21-04-2025

One of the highlights of Saudi Arabia's sporting calendar returned for its fifth edition this past weekend as Formula One's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix took place again in Jeddah.
The race, which has been hosted at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit since 2021, was won on Sunday by Australian Oscar Piastri – with reigning world champion Max Verstappen second and Charles Leclerc third.
As with most F1 races, there were plenty of twists, turns and interesting storylines to emerge from the weekend. Here, Al Arabiya English brings you the key takeaways from the 2025 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
First corner costs Verstappen
Max Verstappen may have won the past four F1 Drivers' Championship in a row, but the Red Bull driver has endured a fairly unhappy start to the 2025 season. Verstappen managed to complete a wire-to-wire win in Japan earlier this month, but failed to emulate that achievement in Saudi Arabia despite qualifying in pole position once again. It means the Dutchman has begun his latest title defense with just one victory from his first five races.
In Jeddah, Verstappen produced an excellent display in qualifying to start at the front of the grid. However, a mistake at the very first corner cost Verstappen dearly. Race officials judged that he had cut the first corner in order to prevent McLaren's Oscar Piastri from overtaking him. Verstappen maintained the race lead until his first pit stop but was forced to serve a five-second time penalty for the earlier incident.
The reigning world champion came out behind new race leader Piastri, who produced a professional drive to take the chequered flag. Verstappen finished just 2.8 seconds behind Piastri, indicating that – remarkably, in a 50-lap race – his mistake at the first corner had cost him the victory. Afterwards, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner later argued that the decision to penalize Verstappen had been the wrong one.
'You can clearly see that at the apex of the corner, we believe that Max is clearly ahead,' Horner said. 'Without that five-second penalty today it would have been a win. When you look at that, I can't see how they got to that conclusion. Oscar has run deep into the corner, Max can't just disappear at that moment in time. I don't know what happened to 'let them race'. That seems to have been abandoned.'
Professional Piastri leads championship
Heading into the 2025 F1 season, most motorsport analysts anticipated a repeat of last year's tussle between Max Verstappen and Lando Norris for the Drivers' Championship. But while Norris got off to a great start with victory in the curtain-raising Australian Grand Prix, it is his McLaren team-mate Piastri who has emerged in recent weeks as the man to beat this season.
Piastri suffered a disastrous opening race in his hometown of Melbourne, but has since turned his season around – winning in China before completing a Gulf double by triumphing in both Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Piastri qualified in second place in Jeddah but it was the Australian's electric start that forced Verstappen into the error that ultimately decided the Grand Prix.
Demonstrating admirable patience, Piastri had to bide his time until Verstappen pitted; from that moment on, he produced a faultless drive to bring his McLaren home in first place. Piastri also provided one of the race's most eye-catching overtakes – narrowly squeezing past Lewis Hamilton's Ferrari with a daring maneuver at a section of the circuit not known as an established spot for passing.
'[I am] Very, very happy to have won, that was a tough race,' Piastri said. 'We've put a lot of work into our starts recently, and in the end, that's played a big part in the victory. It was really tricky out there at times, chewing up the tires, but once we got into clean air it was nice. The team did a great job executing the strategy and we did all the parts right that we needed to. We've still got work to do, it's very close at the front, but it's been a great weekend.'
Norris recovery not enough
Lando Norris could probably have predicted that he would relinquish his Drivers' Championship lead on Sunday. A crash in qualifying on Saturday – which saw him tag the kerb on the exit of Turn 4 before careering into the barrier – meant Norris started the race in 10th place. While most drivers started the Grand Prix on medium tires, he began on a hard compound before switching later.
It made things challenging for the Brit early on but he rallied well to move through the field, immediately aided by a first-lap crash between Pierre Gasly and Yuki Tsunoda ahead of him that took both drivers out of the race. Still, Norris then overtook Lewis Hamilton, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Carlos Sainz Jr and George Russell to climb to fourth place, and was chasing down Ferrari's Leclerc right to the end – finishing just a second behind the Monegasque driver. The result leaves Norris 10 points behind McLaren team-mate and new championship leader Piastri, and two ahead of Verstappen.
'That was a tough one,' Norris said after the race. 'This track is tough, this temperature is tough and it's flat out… I was struggling – not in terms of physically, but just in terms of having enough of an advantage over the rest to come back through as much as I would have wanted. [But] I'm happy with my comeback. It's the best that I could achieve and now I'm looking forward to a break. Clearly, I've got the pace. It's just sometimes I try to ask for a bit too much and sometimes I get a bit too eager for a little bit more and I just need to chill out a little bit.'
Improvement for Ferrari
With a blockbuster new driver pairing of Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, expectation was high among Ferrari officials and fans that the team – which finished as runner-up in the 2024 Constructors' Championship – could close the gap on McLaren this season. But aside from a sprint race victory for Hamilton in China, there has been little for Ferrari to smile about so far.
In Jeddah, however, Ferrari finally claimed its first podium of the season as Leclerc held off a late challenge from Norris to finish third. Having been eighth in the Australian Grand Prix and disqualified at the Chinese Grand Prix, Leclerc has bounced back – following up a pair of fourth places in Japan and Bahrain with third in Saudi Arabia. Leclerc's disciplined drive saw him rein in the Mercedes of George Russell, who had qualified a place ahead, and overtake – before fending off Norris right up until the finish line.
'We absolutely maximized everything this weekend,' Leclerc reflected afterwards. 'We executed the race perfectly, both in terms of strategy and the pit stop. Our mechanics have worked very hard to arrive at this level and I'm really proud of the job our team did today. We made the most of it. Looking forward, we have to focus on qualifying… we will work on finding the right balance there and push to make another step forward.'
For veteran team-mate Hamilton, a seven-time world champion, it was another frustrating Grand Prix. The British driver finished in seventh and though there was an exciting tussle with Norris at one stage, it was an otherwise uneventful race for Hamilton. Afterwards, the 40-year-old – a winner of the Saudi Grand Prix in 2021 – lamented a 'a challenging weekend with a lack of pace and consistency' but promised he is 'focused on working with the team and seeing what we can bring to Miami' in the next Grand Prix on May 4.