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Come Fan with UsFriday, June 19, 2026

Who wins the F1 Drivers’ Championship?

The F1 grid heads to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix with three drivers alive in the title chase. Who wins?

F1 Grand Prix of Qatar - Sprint & Qualifying
F1 Grand Prix of Qatar - Sprint & Qualifying
Mark Schofield
Mark Schofield is a former college quarterback and attorney covering the NFL and F1.

The 2025 Formula 1 season has arrived at its final chapter.

And what a story awaits us.

Max Verstappen’s win in the Qatar Grand Prix kept his hopes alive for a fifth consecutive Drivers’ Championship, and the grid heads to Yas Marina for the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix with three drivers alive in the title chase. Lando Norris continues to lead the way with 408 points, followed by Verstappen now in second with 396, and Oscar Piastri in third with 392.

This is the first time since 2010 when the season finale saw more than two drivers mathematically alive in the title chase. That year four drivers — Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton, Mark Webber (who manages Piastri), and Fernando Alonso arrived in Abu Dhabi with a chance to win the title.

Vettel’s win, coupled with results from the other three drivers, saw him through to his first Drivers’ Championship.

In a moment, we are going to ask you to weigh in on the title race. But before we do, we want to take you through the results of previous surveys, as they mirror how this title chase has unfolded this fall. The first time we asked F1 fans this question came at the end of the Summer Break, ahead of the Dutch Grand Prix. At that time Piastri led the way with 284 points followed by Norris with 275.

Verstappen was mired in third, 97 points behind.

As a result, only Piastri and Norris were included in the poll, which saw Piastri take 58% of the vote:

The next time we put this question to fans was in early October, following the Singapore Grand Prix. While Verstappen finished second in that race, a string of podiums pulled him back into the title race. Following the Singapore Grand Prix Piastri was still in the lead with 336 points while Norris was second with 314. Verstappen, however, had begun to narrow the gap, and was in third with 273 points, now just 63 points behind Piastri.

However, he still finished behind Piastri in the voting:

Then came the next race, the United States Grand Prix. Verstappen swept the weekend in Austin, winning both the F1 Sprint race and the United States Grand Prix itself. As the grid left Texas Piastri’s lead was just 14 points over Norris, and he was only 40 points ahead of Verstappen.

Verstappen’s tenor changed during the week in Austin, as he went from “I’m just taking it race-by-race” when he first met with us on Thursday, to admitting he had a chance to actually pull off the comeback by Sunday night after his win.

Readers agreed:

So we want to know one last time this year: Who wins the 2025 F1 Drivers’ Championship? Does Verstappen pull off a comeback for the ages? Does Norris close out the deal in Abu Dhabi? Or does Piastri storm back to secure his first Drivers’ Championship?

See More:

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