The 2025 F1 Austrian Grand Prix WINNERS & LOSERS

McLaren conquered Spielberg and Red Bull walked away with nothing.

Climb the ladder with me over on Patreon: https://patreon.com/lawvs

In this more raw race report than usual, there was a lot to unpack despite the leader of the race ultimately remaining the same from qualifying. McLaren’s pace was without doubt at the 2025 Austrian Grand Prix as Lando Norris sealed victory. This means that Oscar Piastri’s championship advantage is down to 15 points and with Max Verstappen being sent out of the race by Kimi Antontelli, his championship defense looks almost impossible to claw back. Behind him Liam Lawson’s flawless one-stop carried Racing Bulls into the constructors fight for sixth while Sauber’s upgrades let Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg harass an ailing George Russell and his Mercedes. Ferrari stayed steady with a top-four double finish and shut Red Bull out on home ground. Fernando Alonso’s crafty one-stop proved age is only a number as Lance Stroll and Alpine faded, Williams burned through another reliability horror and Yuki Tsunoda’s tough weekend summed up Red Bull’s worst home race in years, if not ever.

🐦 https://twitter.com/LawVSX
🕚 https://tiktok.com/@lawvsf1
🧵 https://threads.net/@lawvsx

00:00 The Winners
10:18 The Meh
13:38 The Losers

#f1 #austriangp #formula1 #f1news #f1latest #formulaone #austriangrandprix #f1predictions #predictions #maxverstappen #redbullracing #mclaren #charlesleclerc #redbull #f12025 #formula12025 #oscarpiastri #sauber #landonorris #mclaren

2025 Austrian Grand Prix: The WINNERS & LOSERS
The 2025 F1 Austrian Grand Prix WINNERS & LOSERS

Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976, “fair use” is allowed for things like criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarshipand research. Fair use is when a copyright law lets you use something in a way that would otherwise be against the law. In some scenes, race footage from the Formula 1 calendar is used whose rights belong to FOM. Other photos and news items are only used to help the original content.

okay I know exactly what you’re thinking You’re probably thinking that was a really really interesting Grand Prix law but then also that this isn’t the ladder It It’s It is art I’ve been at the Austrian Grand Prix in person If you’ve not been paying attention to the vlogs I’ve been making I’ll leave a link down to it in the pinned comment It had plenty of winners losers and a lot of them So we are still going to be doing that tradition But do forgive me if it’s a little bit more raw but I think it’s safe to say that McLaren were the absolute winners of this Grand Prix because throughout the entire weekend there was no stopping them In particular Lando Norris Now credit where credit is due here after what happened at the Canadian Grand Prix This is the kind of result that we needed to see from Norris because this is a very very good track for him It’s where he got his first podium He was so close to winning it last year This was a real endeavor And not only that there were moments when Pastry could have easily taken it He didn’t fumble He held his nerve And it was Oscar who made the mistake And the beauty of all of this is that everyone remained calm and the strategies went off without a hitch Say for Pastri having a sticky front left tire that took a couple of seconds extra and Franco Colipinto taking him off into the grass And we’ll talk more about that in the Alpine section later in the video They are not winners which is going to make this championship battle all the more interesting because Norris in this expert Grand Prix victory has narrowed the gap to 15 points and Mattress Stappen got a DNF He’s now no longer figuring It is definitely now the two McLaren boys which for Lando is absolutely splendid And it does take away a lot of the demons that have been surrounding him in the last couple of weeks that people thought that he just couldn’t hack a championship battle with either Vstafen or Pestre Well he was able to do it He can now put all the stuff that happened last year with the staff at turn three behind him And he came out of it on top not only against the Dutchman effectively at one of the Dutchman’s home races cuz the Orange Army was strong over there in turn six and seven but also against the Australian which everyone including myself really rated in terms of well you know being a championship contender But I am more than happy to say that even though my boy pushed him to the absolute edge to be within a couple of seconds at Lando Strong Track which is saying something ultimately he didn’t do it Norris held out He didn’t bottle it This was a non-bottling event So good job Lando Well done Now it’s going to be Silverstone I’m really interested to see what he can do there because well there’s the Lando stand there And apparently the curbs around Stow will be painted fluorescent yellow and black So if there’s any place that Lando could do backto-back victories it’s going to be this one Actually having no ladder is uh it’s given me a lot of freedom in terms of movement Maybe I should Yeah I’m not I wouldn’t do that to you No no you’d crumble But one person who didn’t crumble was Liam Lawson because not many people were talking about it And I know that many people are going to be coming after me in the comments after my video the other day saying that Red Bull could drop Liam Lawson I said could And one of the mission statements in that video I said was one thing he needs to do immediately after the Limblad FP1 thing in Silverstone is to beat Hajar Well Liam beat Hajar And not only did he beat him he beat him comprehensively and with style Most importantly with a one-stop strategy as far as I can tell and yeah this is a raw report I don’t have all the facts and figures because well my internet access wasn’t that great and I’m just going on what I was able to scramble on the bus ride home well to the hotel But starting off with a qualifying he described as yeah really cool mate He then actually held on to P6 and Lawson was directly opposite where I was sat in the grand stand and it was a simple just procedure even though Fernando Alonzo was giving him a run for his money all the way to the bitter end And there were moments when Liam could have almost gone after George Russell because Mercedes were having a good time but also he’s now in the double figures and he’s now locked in Racing Balls in sixth place in the constructors And considering that Williams are really being riddled with unreliability issues right now and Racing Bulls are nailing it I’m almost thinking they could make a good bid for that dream fifth place that France Toss envisioned years ago And funnily enough France Toss was actually at the event and oh yeah outqualifying Vstappen effectively on home turf of one of the three main races that the Dutch fans come out in their dros I mean yes of course the Vstappen crash helped him a little bit It did take Max out of the equation but as I said many times points mean prices and points came out in absolute space for Sala Once again this is just proving Saba this is not a fluke They brought yet more upgrades to Austria I told you to look out for Gardi at this track and he delivered There was a brief period where he was within 2 seconds of Russell And he’s going blindy a Salva right behind me To what do I do i’m not prepared for this eventuality And Hulkenberg what have we got to say about Hulenberg due to the mistiming in Q1 Hulenberg started at the back and he did what Oliver Beman’s been impressively doing this year a burn from the Stern campaign Thanks to strategy and overall pace and competitiveness with the upgrades of his own he was within a few seconds of Borletto And it makes you wonder had he qualified he might have made the top five again And that would have just shown that what we saw in Barcelona wasn’t an absolute fluke There is something to this car and we need to see more of it And based on what border ledger has been saying Silverstone might be just as prosperous And if it is then Sala could easily find themselves surging themselves up the ranks because sure there’s still neither the constructors but it’s all to play for right now They all the teams left Alpine in the dust They absolutely have And there’s just three points between Sala in ninth and in seventh One good result and one so so result the others could change everything absolutely everything And this race was the turning point for Gabrielle because no one really paid much attention to him Even though Boralto is managed by Fernando Alonzo was not going to be giving him an easy ride That old dog was not going to be giving him any handouts because well he almost ran him off the road There was Pastri and Norris right there And Fernando was just like not having any of it He was trying to unlap himself in front of Lando Oh jeez what are you doing i mean is that revenge for all the bad years with McCarron he was doing desperate moves to keep in front the B That was epic those last couple of laps because those two just didn’t care that the leaders were lapping them And then right at the end it was all fine It was absolute gravy for them They did embrace and it was like almost like on the helmet and it’s like did you imagine what just happened and I bet that if bought Leo had overtaken Alonzo Fernando would have bought him dinner Sorry apologies for the overenthusiasm here but spending days listening to Babetti on the commentary it it does rub off on you But Fernando Alonzo innov pegging with Lance Stroll I sorry Fernando still got it and what he was able to do with Bortalto the ducking and diving the car control in amidst being blue flagged all over the place Even though he’s as old as time he’s still able to put that car where he wants it to and not crash the damn thing And it was also like with Lawson on a one stopper because Alonzo just missed out on Q3 but getting seventh place it didn’t really matter It meant that he had some more tires even though he barely used them that one stopper worked and it just showed that in theory even though it was really hot conditions the one stop worked and it worked for Alonzo Ferrari are also winners here as well because out of all of the teams behind McLaren Ferrari looked the most composed Their upgrades which I thought were coming for Silverstone but they came for here did work Both Ferraris in the top four and they remained in the top four Okay Shaw did fall back one place but that was against a McLaren so that was to be expected But Shaw held his own Lewis did fall back quite a bit He wasn’t really figuring in anything But in a way it was just something that equal his result from Imola There wasn’t really much going on in terms of drama except that we did have a little bit of a radio snafu or a little bit of discontent when Lewis was saying I don’t want to stop right now These tires are good These are fine So he is experiencing Lewis the problems with Ferrari just not really getting the memo in terms of preferences in that they really do rely on the data That’s the only quibble really And out of the Mercedes Red Bull group that they find themselves in they’re now on top This is I think their best joint result in a bull Grand Prix And I think it’s something that is now to force and it might be the thing that keeps Fred Vaser his job for another year because Lewis is not that far off the podium Charlotte has gotten yet another one And even though this might lead to the development struggles and what to do for this year specifically whether to continue development or not this is still something that Ferrari will just take with both hands That this was a weekend where there was no drama There was no problem with the car They weren’t slow They were competitive Even though they were going to be playing sick and fiddle the McLaren but right now that doesn’t matter They just want to get their eggs in one basket and get one over Mercedes and get one especially over at Red Bull at their home track So that’s all that Ferrari cares about right now And then we get to the section and the M section starts off with one George Russell Now sure fifth place It’s another top five finish It’s consistent points and as far as the championship is concerned if he wants to get one over one max for Stappen then he’s done So 10 more points than max He’s now got himself that little bit closer to P3 in the championship which might be the best that anyone who isn’t dressed in papaya can hope for But there’s also a caveat to that I believe he was this close to being lapped or he was lapped And going from the Canadian win that was so emphatic and showing that Mercedes might have turned a corner and then going to be absolutely nowhere in terms of going for a podium That’s a major reality check and I don’t think Toto would appreciate that And that wasn’t the worst of their issues there There clearly was something wrong with this car in terms of it not being competitive at all I mean that would explain why I bought a letter and got within a few seconds of them I mean can you imagine that a SA overtaking Mercedes that’s absolutely insane Although ironic because Salva did start their F1 career with Mercedes So not a good day for him I mean it was fine but considering the rumors about Max and Mercedes just will not go away and they’re even intensifying with all the crypted things Toto is saying I think he’s going to be coming away from this weekend with like not much to be happy about other than the fact that he scored more than Max And then I will put H in the section I wouldn’t call them absolute winners here because Okan I think over the radio was still saying that there needs to be more pace found in this car and it was very much explained with him being out in Q1 and Bman got into Q2 and they ultimately got to 10th and 11th which is not too bad for a midfield team but when you’re considering that Lawson scored way more than them and that Salva scored way more than them even though they’re hanging on to seventh it’s a very very close drop from seventh to ninth There’s three points in it And now racing bulls have got an advantage now that the second driver Liam Lawson the refugee from Red Bull has suddenly decided that oh I like the car now And so therefore it means that H needs to find that pace which AON was talking about Even though they like the environment that they’re in Ollie and Esban and Bman doesn’t really have a problem with the car it simply just doesn’t have the pace Had the Saudis not been there then this might have been a pretty decent weekend for H But well the other Ferrari powered team were there and they’re upgrading much faster than anyone else in the midfield And yeah I was thinking about putting Isaac Kajar in the losers but ultimately P12 in the grand scheme of things it’s just a Ben or something like that It was just scruffy It wasn’t great It was still 12th It was reasonable but it was nothing in comparison to Liam but it’s like the skin of its teeth because the Racing Bulls team is still like the sixth fastest team or maybe seventh fastest team So it is within the natural area where Racing Bulls would expect to be but then again you’ve got to consider that we had a couple of retirements as well And yeah it’s just a you know what no it now I’m going to have them starting the losers It was a very forgettable time of it And there’s not really much else to say with Hajar It was just one unfortunate time where Lawson just simply outshone him It was a scruffy It was me I think that’s maybe why I’ve described it as being me because there wasn’t really much to report about It was just he wasn’t fast enough There you go And now we get to the losers and at their home track too Yuki Cenoda and Max Fappen I would say were the biggest losers here because well Max barely got to turn three the turn that caused all the problems from last year because of contact with Kimmy Anteneelli and with Yuki Cenoda well he qualified 18 and according to statistics that the last five races his qualifying performance has been the worst of any bull driver in history He then had contact with Colinto in that he initiated it at the very same place that Hamilton and Alban made contact a few years ago and he got a 10-second penalty at the home track If there’s any place that Yuki needed to perform it was the home track and he didn’t do it And Max was stappen you would have expected him to have blown his top but he didn’t This was a incident where he did utter an exploitive but it was relatively passive He just went “I’m out.” And I mean of course he would have been probably on notice And now the Grand Prix has passed and he’s not been in trouble with the stewards He’s not been told he’s a naughty boy He now will have two penalty points expiring So he’s now down to nine So there is a little bit more wiggle room to be had But I don’t expect him to be really all that aggressive because according to him in qualifying the car was just simply not there The lap fell apart And even though many people thought that he could have just had time to go around again after Gastly span in Q3 he simply just didn’t do it He gave up He aborted the lap thinking that there wasn’t really much point So you already had a driver who was down in the dumps and he did make up a place I think he got up to sick before he made contact with Kimmy but even then it was probably not going to be much of a good day in the office He would have been behind the Ferraris He might have been able to duke it out with Russell a little bit because he was managing George’s brake temperatures whereas Max had a fully functional car and Max wasn’t even able to do that because now this is meaning that Red Bull scored no points at their home circuit I’m sorry if I keep mentioning but it’s a really big deal Red Bull are now very much in P4 and the constructors They are now I think 47 points behind Mercedes in third and I believe this is his first fullblown retirement maxes in 31 races since the Australian Grand Prix of last year And another thing that had been broken and crashed down hard was Kimmy Antonelli After that podium in Canada along with the win Mercedes completely fell to bit It was a miserable weekend for them because they weren’t even figuring in trying for a podium with George And with Kimmy he locked up and ultimately tagged the defending world champion the guy who according to many reports will be his teammate next year if the rumors are led to be true Alleged rumors And it’s almost like Kimmy is getting the cardinal center of Formula 1 out early before they’re actually teammates And yeah Max has no bad blood toward the young Italian saying according to journalists in reports that oh all drivers make that mistake And Versafan has actually been on Antonelli’s side many times saying that he should be allowed to make mistakes because he is so young and he is going to make them like he did when he was a young lad So he is actually being very defensive of Antonelli and I think that is a really good tact for the Dutchman showing that he isn’t just going to fly off the handle every single time that he is thinking rationally here But one thing to think rationally is that the last few races apart from Canada have actually been really bad and a big wakeup call a smack in the face for the young Italian And it all started ironically at Imola effectively his home circuit After that it’s been a really rough ride for him and Mercedes save for Montreal But that now might be a false dawn unless Silverstone comes around again and the temperatures don’t turn out to be so bad And then there’s Lance Stroll There really isn’t much to be said He was simply nowhere in comparison to Alonzo which is not going to be good news to the likes of Adrian Newui when he’s developing next year’s car If Lance can’t provide him good feedback then I can imagine Newi going “No I can’t work with this I really can’t.” There’s nothing more to say because as I said earlier Fernandez making the car dance whereas But the other two big losers are Williams and Alpine I’ll start with Williams first because their car went off with a big bang Carl Science not only stalling on the grid as I saw for my own two eyes but also then when he got to the pit lane his brakes caught fire both of them and the smoke continued to billow for many minutes We all thought there was going to be a full-blown explosion That certainly would have made his race day a little bit more interesting Carlos because this is yet another Q1 exit And then he didn’t even get to start the race to try and make up some ground because as we saw with Hulenberg he could actually get that car into the points There might have been an opportunity for Williams And then Albon he had a fantastic start Before I knew it he went up from 12th to sixth And with the Williams he might have actually been able to stay there But then according to Vowels there was some sort of unexplained fault which might be explained by the time this video comes out But I really hope it’s not a power train issue a third one in a row where they have to retire the car early because this is getting really bad that yeah that car may have some pace every now and again especially with the tie driver but if it just can’t get it to the end of the race then what’s the point and that huge lead that they had over the rest of the midfield is starting to erode And Racing Bulls is pulling back in They’re now like 23 points behind Williams I think And that can easily be taken out more and more and more if Williams continue to not finish races or have a couple of drivers who don’t make it into Q3 and therefore their work is made easy And if Lawson has suddenly arrived and he’s able to get Q3 performances and then Hajar comes back and these two can get points finishes both of them and now Salbor in the frame and then has to get some upgrades Whims could be in some trouble here but I don’t think they would really care I mean they’ve sucked good success and they want more but they shouldn’t really lose focus on what they’re doing for next year which I think they are doing But we are also seeing that there are limitations to this year’s car And it did result in them not really figuring much at all because yeah Alex had a great start but what’s the point if you don’t make it to the finish and then to wrap things up Alpine my goodness there wasn’t really much to be said with Pierre because even though he did start off in Q3 P10 he even started on the softs and he was looking likely to make some names after inheriting sixth I think for a brief time when Albon did retire He then just completely fell down the order saying on the radio that he there was no pace in the car that he just had nothing to give and eventually he was falling into the clutches of Franco Colapinto who sure he started in 14th he did make some progress he wasn’t that far behind Gastley in the end of the day in terms of pure pace but unfortunately Colinto wasn’t right there to then take charge of the Alpine team and then drag them up to maybe challenging for a point which at a brief moment he was able to do But Franco’s chances of trying to get for the top 10 was scuppered by Cenoda because that was an unfortunate tap But then the goodwill towards Franco did dissipate in my mind when he forced Pastri off the track completely and nearly ended his race And I’m I’m sorry Colipinto fans I like your kid I really do I think he’s got potential No no no no no no no I would understand if it was an accident Okay but that could have easily led to both of them being retired Had Pastri not kept that car pointing straight had spun it would have taken them both out And this is not the first time these two have fangled because of an Abu Dhabi although it was Pastry sold that time But yeah Franco did get let off lightly It was a 5-second time penalty instead of a 10-second one but the damage was done Had that not happened Pastry might have gotten a little bit closer to Lando maybe in DRS territory Franco I think did have moments where he was handling that car better than Gastley because Gassley was losing his temper There’s a lot riding on the Frenchman and there’s just simply nothing in that car There might be for a few laps but then eventually it all fades away toward the end of the race and then ultimately Halpine are definitely the guys holding the wooden spoon 15 points behind Sala This is falling apart This is falling apart now badly Who’s going to want to buy this team unless I had a brief morbid moment if Hyundai if they were interested in buying their way into Formula 1 Imagine if they bought Alpine serial adul down in teams and oh the irony The guy that would have bought the team from them is the guy they kicked out not that long ago Christian Warner will be absolutely furious But one thing I think will definitely not make you furious are my explorations of the Austrian Grand Prix itself in four easy peasy vlogs to watch them from day one itself Watch this video next straight after this one And don’t worry in the next video the ladder will be