Follow the Japanese Grand Prix, Sky Sports F1 Evaluate the key conversation points that emerged from the third round of the 2025 Formula 1 season.

Verstappen question reminder

Until Saturday’s final minutes of the third quarter of Suzuki, you’ll have a hard time finding a guy in the paddock instead of predicting anything outside of McLaren one and two – in qualifying and Sunday’s games.

Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri won and pole positions in the first two rounds, and this pattern looks set to continue, after McLarens appeared to dominate throughout the practice.

The front row showed up when Norris led Piastri in his second run in the second run in the third quarter, but the four-time world champion was still completing his final lap.

At the Media Center – overlooking the last corner of the famous tour – gradually realizing that Verstappen can be shocked. Then it can only be described as awesome noise in the crowd across the stands, suggesting that the Dutch had taken down one of the most unlikely Poles of his career.

Given that overtaking proved nearly impossible, as the car struggled to follow the dirty air on its high-speed layout, Verstappen’s Sunday mission was relatively simple as he undoubtedly controlled the race, becoming the first driver to win four consecutive victories at Suzuka.

While no one has forgotten Verstappen’s hope for the fifth straight World Championship, his performance in Japan – he is now just one point for Norris to fall behind Norris at the top of the standings – at least temporarily and quietly talks about McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton – Nico Rosberg’s internal title in McLaren’s lineup.

McLaren strategy under scrutiny

During the season’s opening week, Norris repeatedly expressed his belief that the strength of the McLaren driver lineup gave his team a significant advantage over the rest of the grid.

The British were right about several counts, perhaps the most critical of his and Piastri’s understanding of the MCL39 and their ability to assist in finding the best setup and developing a car throughout the season.

There is no doubt that having the fastest car will improve the chances of two people to win, but in Japan, there is evidence that having two evenly matched drivers can also be a barrier.

McLaren, who played two opponents against Verstappen, approached the lonely pit stop of the game, but chose to do nothing about it as they first ranked Piastri from third place rather than trying to undercut Verstappen with Norris the second time.

The leading duo all fell behind a lap, and it was just a rare poor Red Bull pit stop, before Verstappen closed the door, Norris smelled the lead when they left the pit and locked it up for the rest of the afternoon.

McLaren said they stopped Piastri first to avoid the risk of him being weakened by the car behind him, but should they prioritize giving Norris a win over Verstappen or would they be more proactive to avoid allowing this to develop?

People suspect that McLaren does not want to risk driving order changes and stay in Hungary’s 2024-residential situation where they need to execute team orders to restore positions.

Ultimately, they made Red Bull and Verstappen stay ahead as easily as possible, and Norris proposed the logic after the game. Interestingly, how does he think about having such a strong teammate throughout the season.

Tsunoda’s weekend in the spotlight

While Verstappen was the focus of attention by the end of the weekend, it was his new Red Bull teammate Yuki Tsunoda who received great attention during his home game, reaching Suzuka.

Tsunoda’s Tornado saw him finally advance to the Racing Bulls Red Bulls in a few weeks as Liam Lawson was extremely relegated to the junior high school team in just two games this season.

The early signs were good, as Tsunoda showed enough steady performance throughout the practice, but he showed enough solid performance in the final lap of the second quarter, but he showed enough steady performance in the training, but he stood out in the final lap of the second quarter, giving him 14th place on the grid, slightly awkwardly, the place behind Lawson.

The difficulty of overtaking means he can only manage the twelfth and thus fails to achieve the weekend goals he stated, but Red Bull Training Camp has many positive attitudes toward his overall impact.

Red Bull gave Tsunoda much more conservative car setup than Verstappen entered the qualifying round, which was understandable in his first weekend with the team. As Tsunoda becomes more satisfied with how the RB21 team will be fascinating.

While Tsunoda will continue to attract significant attention in the coming weeks, it won’t give him the chance to spin and prove that he belongs to the front of the grid, as it did in Japan.

Ferrari is exposed again

In addition to Tsunoda, the individuals in the paddock were most satisfied with the driver exchange of Red Bull – and the anger they caused – most likely Frederic Vasseur, headmaster of the Ferrari team.

Announced the Red Bull plan to exchange drivers’ plans leaked at the Chinese Grand Prix Sunday night, announcing Ferrari’s double disqualification for the Shanghai competition.

This story – Ferrari’s overall disappointing start to the season – would have received more coverage if it weren’t for an unprecedented scene in the garage next door.

After another extremely impressive weekend, Charles Leclerc ranked fourth and Lewis Hamilton for the seventh time, this time Vasseur’s only favorable thing was that on Friday, the car was back on track in Bahrain, leaving only limited time left to dig out the Ferrari’s problems.

Hamilton admitted on Saturday that Ferrari could not have the same low car as they lost their qualification to wear overboard, and then said on Sunday that the elements on his car were “underperforming” compared to Leclerc.

While we only hear radio exchange points between the driver and the engineer throughout the race, Hamilton and Laker’s summary reflects the frustrated pairing.

It’s not surprising, and the team is expected to be McLaren’s biggest champion challenger, in addition to Hamilton’s sprint victory in China.

The question is whether it is possible to sort any questions using the settings changes, or this will be a picture of Ferrari until some upgrades arrive.

Rookie Revival after Doohan Crash

From a rookie perspective, the weekend wasn’t very good when Jack Doohan failed to get close to the first corner in a straight line and thunder entered the barrier at 185mph.

Doohan was declared as Haas’s reserve driver after operating Japanese reserve driver Ryo Hirakawa in the Alpine, and in the Australian’s first practice he was declared as Haas’s reserve driver, limiting his preparation time on the extremely challenging track.

While the decision is questionable and may be motivated by some kind of sponsorship agreement, it does not justify the embarrassing “misjudgment”, as the team described.

After struggling in the qualifying race, Duhan drove a respectable race, but the huge crash only raised speculation that he would drive him faster in his first practice in Bahrain later this week than to replace later.

On a more positive point of view, Andrea Kimi Antonelli has had the best performance in his career so far as he lags directly behind Mercedes teammate George Russell, but the striking pace seems to be more than the British.

Despite the particularly high expectations for Antonelli, there is no doubt that Isack Hadjar has greatly exceeded the Racing Bulls’ expectations for him.

In overcoming a strange and painful episode – full of broadcast gold – at the beginning of the qualifying match, where his seat belt caused pain in the groin area, Hadjar finished seventh and eighth in the competition, finishing first in the sport. Deserved.

Meanwhile, Britain’s own Oliver Bearman won a great start to the season at the last point of 10th, surpassing Haas teammate Esteban Ocon in all respects.

Formula 1 will continue to hold a triple head for the Bahrain Grand Prix this weekend in Sakhir, covering from Sky Sports F1 on Friday. Streaming with Sky Sports now – no contract, cancel at any time