![\"Mark](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0af0bfa80ab8e879014b4173937c59bf855cbf74.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nEven if Norris finishes outside the top 10, or doesn\u2019t finish the race, he can still be champion provided Verstappen finishes fourth or lower, and Piastri third or lower.<\/p>\n
How Verstappen can win<\/p>\n
Verstappen has scored 191 points to the 216 combined by Norris and Piastri since round 15, and has won five of the past eight grands prix. The 28-year-old Dutchman\u2019s simplest road to the title is to win with Norris fourth or worse.<\/p>\n
But Verstappen can also win the championship if he finishes second with Norris eighth or lower if Piastri doesn\u2019t win, and by finishing third if Norris is ninth or lower and Piastri doesn\u2019t win.<\/p>\n
How Piastri can win<\/p>\n
Loading<\/p>\n
Piastri\u2019s path is narrower. If he wins in Abu Dhabi, Piastri will be champion if Norris is sixth or lower, no matter where Verstappen finishes. The Australian will also be crowned champion if he finishes second and Norris is 10th or lower, and Verstappen fourth or lower.<\/p>\n
Abu Dhabi form guide<\/p>\n
In Abu Dhabi, Verstappen (four wins) is the second-most successful driver in the circuit\u2019s 16-year tenure behind Lewis Hamilton (five), while Norris won from pole at Yas Marina last season after never finishing better than fifth in five previous visits.<\/p>\n
In just his third season, Piastri\u2019s Abu Dhabi resume is sparse; he finished sixth as a rookie in 2023, and recovered from the back to 10th last season after he was spun at the first corner by Verstappen, who was penalised for causing the collision.<\/p>\n
Qualifying is critical at Yas Marina; the past 10 pole-sitters have won in Abu Dhabi, with Hamilton in 2014 the most recent driver to win who didn\u2019t start first.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mark Webber and Red Bull teammate Sebastian Vettel in 2010.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Why Piastri can be optimistic<\/p>\n
While Piastri has the weakest statistical case for winning the title (from third place), the most recent three-way championship decider shows that anything is possible, as a member of his inner circle knows painfully well.<\/p>\n
In 2010, the first year of F1\u2019s current points format allocating 25 points for the winner, Red Bull Racing\u2019s Sebastian Vettel came to Abu Dhabi in third place and 15 points off the championship lead, but won the race and the title when series leader Fernando Alonso (Ferrari) and Mark Webber (Red Bull) \u2013 now Piastri\u2019s manager \u2013 were jumped by the German after they finished just seventh and eighth, Vettel securing the first of four consecutive titles by four points.<\/p>\n
More optimism for Piastri? Ferrari\u2019s Kimi Raikkonen was third entering the 2007 finale in Brazil, behind McLaren pair Hamilton and Alonso, but won the title by a single point after winning the race when he was seven points down on Hamilton under F1\u2019s old points allocation that awarded 10 points for the winner; under today\u2019s system, Raikkonen was the equivalent of 18 points behind, further than Piastri this weekend.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s at stake? <\/p>\n
A Verstappen title would be the crowning glory of his 11-year career, given the triple-digit deficit the Dutchman faced two-thirds of the way through the season.<\/p>\n
The Red Bull driver\u2019s win in Qatar was the 70th of his career \u2013 only Hamilton (105) and Michael Schumacher (91) have more \u2013 and a fifth consecutive crown would make him just the second driver to achieve that feat behind Schumacher, who reigned for Ferrari from 2000-04 (after also winning back-to-back crowns for Benetton in 1994-95).<\/p>\n
Norris will become the 11th British driver to become champion if he converts, and the first McLaren champion since Hamilton in 2008, while a 13th title for a McLaren driver would see the British team narrow the gap to Ferrari (15, but none since 2007).<\/p>\n
A Piastri title would be Australia\u2019s first for 45 years since Jones won for Williams, while he would surpass the career-best seasons of Webber (third in 2010, 2011 and 2013) and Daniel Ricciardo (third in 2014 and 2016) if he\u2019s runner-up or better.<\/p>\n
![\"Alan](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/c1a4f54fe8e13b26a44c955d94818fdf7fecc309.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Alan Jones (right) after winning the United States Grand Prix West in 1981.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Three big unknowns<\/p>\n
Wildcards: Can a driver for another team \u2013 likely Mercedes, perhaps Ferrari \u2013 get into the mix? Mercedes\u2019 George Russell (fourth in the championship with two victories) seems the most likely, and the British driver has an Abu Dhabi podium (third in 2023) on his CV. Ferrari\u2019s Charles Leclerc has finished second, second and third in the past three Abu Dhabi Grands Prix, but Ferrari\u2019s late-season slump has dropped the team to fourth in the constructors\u2019 standings.<\/p>\n
Verstappen\u2019s tactics: Might Verstappen, who needs to win and have Norris finish off the podium, get to the lead and back up the pack to put Norris under attack from behind at a track where passing can be difficult and the pace managed by the leader? It\u2019s not unprecedented for an Abu Dhabi championship decider; in 2016, Hamilton took the lead but slowed the pace dramatically to have Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg under siege from the rest before Rosberg eventually finished second and won the title.<\/p>\n
![\"McLaren](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1764873371_576_8ffa284439da84db2870612e513e483cbaac18b306560584bd185783d17210c3.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.Credit: Artwork: Aresna Villanueva<\/p>\n
McLaren\u2019s team orders: In a situation where Verstappen is leading with Piastri third and Norris fourth \u2013 a scenario that would give Verstappen the title \u2013 would McLaren ask Piastri to move aside, making a mockery of its ethos to maintain fairness between its drivers through its hotly debated \u201cpapaya rules\u201d? Would Piastri acquiesce to allow Norris to win a title that, for large parts of 2025, looked set to be his? Would Norris demand to be let past, knowing how that would feed into the suggestion that the team would prefer he, rather than Piastri, win the title \u2013 or would the end justify the means?<\/p>\n
The verdict<\/p>\n
Verstappen has momentum and pedigree, Norris the points advantage and Piastri the pace from Qatar that was a hallmark of his early-season surge. Remember, after his win in Saudi Arabia in round four, he led the standings for the next six months.<\/p>\n
Loading<\/p>\n
As always in Abu Dhabi, qualifying will carry outsized importance, and a Norris\/Verstappen front row \u2013 given that the former has everything to lose and the latter nothing \u2013 will make the 194-metre run from pole position to the braking point for the left-handed first corner the most tense opening seconds of any race this season.<\/p>\n
Norris is likely to be more tentative in battle than the combative Verstappen, while Piastri\u2019s race-controlling pace is such that, of the seven grands prix he\u2019s won this season, he\u2019s spent at least 85 per cent of five of them in the lead.<\/p>\n
If Piastri gets to the front, he\u2019s every chance to check out as he did in Qatar, with what happens behind him \u2013 or on the McLaren pit wall \u2013 the deciding factor in how this compelling season ends.<\/p>\n