2025 Miami Thoughts
THE BIG PICTURE: When the past two seasons were looked back upon, the Miami GP proved to be the pivotal moment -- Verstappen crushing Perez, Norris winning his first signaling the rise of McLaren. Will this prove to be a similar moment if Piastri wins the title?
EVENT: This event is perhaps the most polarizing for fans, arguably more so than Las Vegas. And now they have signed an extension of an unheard of amount of time, through 2041. This race fills a niche, even if us regular fans don't like that. Overall, it's good for F1. Besides, the life size driveable lego cars are the best thing to hit F1 since cars were invented.
TRACK: Like Las Vegas, this track was blasted by fans when it first was announced. And like Las Vegas, it has produced two straight, exciting, thrilling, races. There is one advantage of putting a track in a parking lot -- there are no buildings to dictate the layout, which usually causes mostly 90 degree turns.
SPRINT SHOOTOUT: A bizarre strategy by Mercedes hung Russell out to dry but it helped make Kimi Antonelli an 18-year-old pole sitter while a messy SQ1 left some drivers fuming.
SPRINT: So much for everyone settling into their positions and saving their cars for qualifying. That was one wild race despite ending under the safety car.
SPRINT START: Rain disappointment led to start suspension led to Antonelli's first standing start from pole. But he got beat out by Piastri and then fell two more places.
QUALIFYING: Verstappen once again maxes everything out for another amazing pole, Norris at least beats out Piastri, Antonelli is super impressive again, both Williams are ahead of both Ferraris, Tsunoda does make it to Q3 but 10th in the end, Hamilton continues to struggle, and the "junior" drivers, Doohan and Bortoleto, beat out their senior counterparts.
RACE: Absolute epic wheel to wheel battles throughout the field. Absolutely epic.
START: Verstappen gets off great but locks up which has Norris trying to pass only to lose space and a slew of places all while Antonelli sweeps around outside of Piastri for second. Lawson and Doohan come together costing the driver under pressure his race.
PIASTRI: Three in a row. Four out of five. Mr. Composure is changing the whole narrative for the season.
NORRIS: Piastri has six career wins all in the past two years. Lando has five career wins all in the past two years. Just saying... When does Oscar officially become McLaren's #1?
MCLAREN: Talk about superiority.
RUSSELL: Despite a slow pit stop and despite the VSC ending at the end of his pit stop, George still managed to get past Verstappen on exit to grab the final podium spot. Mr. Consistency strikes again.
ANTONELLI: A brilliant weekend for Kimi. Except for his bad luck in pit lane.
VERSTAPPEN: Yes, sometimes he plays dirty. But when Max is clean, it's a marvel watching his defensive tactics.
TSUNODA: Unfortunately, Yuki was still 30 seconds behind Verstappen, before the penalty, at the end.
ALBON: An exceptional weekend.
SAINZ: Carlos and Leclerc fighting for position, which Leclerc won, but ultimately allowed Hamilton to past Sainz somehow feels like the perfect metaphor between these three drivers.
WILLIAMS: Another team which blundered their strategy calls.
FERRARI: What a bunch of idiots. They knew they were running two different strategies with two different tire choices. Yet, they still dithered over what to do.
HADJAR: Another strong run.
ALONSO: Still zero points. And the only veteran without any.
DOOHAN: It was obvious on Saturday by the nature of his outburst against his team that Jack is done for at Alpine.
ALPINE: Still continues to be a management mess.
F1 ACADEMY: Frenchwoman Doriane Pin went from sixth to first in the reverse grid first race. Sadly, the second race never happened due to torrential rain, much to the chagrin of American pole sitter, Chloe Chambers.
WORD OF THE WEEKEND: Legos.
STAT OF THE WEEKEND: The winner of the Miami GP has never come from the starting front row. Pretty odd for a "street" course.
HISTORICAL STAT OF THE WEEKEND: The last McLaren driver to win three in a row was Mika Häkkinen. And, it was his first three career wins. He took the 1997 finale, the European GP at Jerez, followed by wins at the 1998 season opener in Australia (where David Coulthard was told to let him by after a team snafu caused Häkkinen to mistakenly pit) and the next race in Brazil. Häkkinen went on to win the 1998 world driving championship which he repeated in 1999.
QUOTE OF THE WEEKEND: Lewis Hamilton was gold for quotes during the Ferrari strategy decision mess. When he was finally told to swap ahead of Leclerc, he said, "Have a tea break while you're at it."
QUOTE OF THE WEEKEND RUNNERUP: Then after being told to swap back behind Leclerc and was notified Sainz was 1.4 seconds behind, Hamilton said, "You want me to let him past as well?"
SCHEDULE: Off to Imola for the last time (at least in the foreseeable future) as Kimi Antonelli gets to apply his impressive traits in his home country and Ferrari tries not to cock-up in front of the Tifosi.
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