Sunday was the Japanese Grand Prix! The lead-up to this race was full of excitement, though there wasn’t much action during the event itself.
This was Yuki Tsunoda’s (Red Bull) first race driving alongside Max Verstappen (Red Bull) at Red Bull. Red Bull performed well this weekend with Verstappen getting pole and then winning the race, and Tsunoda placed 12th.
Looking at the results of the Visa CashApp Racing Bulls team, where Tsunoda was before, we can see that they placed farther apart than the Red Bull drivers. Liam Lawson (VCARB), who previously held the Red Bull seat, placed 17th. His teammate Isack Hadjar (VCARB) secured 8th place. Overall, it seems that Red Bull made the right choice for now to make the switch from Lawson to Tsunoda.
McLaren continued to take home the trophies this weekend with Lando Norris (McLaren) and Oscar Piastri (McLaren) qualified and placed 2nd and 3rd. Verstappen and Norris are now only one point away from each other in the Driver’s Championship.
The reason this was considered a “boring” race by fans was due to the fact that there were no DNFs or even many changes in the placement at the top of the grid. The last place this happened was during the Monaco Grand Prix in 2024, where the grid largely stayed the same, save from a crash at the beginning of the race.
The most interesting thing that happened in this race was Norris driving on the grass when exiting the pit lane. Verstappen later made a comment, joking that Norris noticed the grass wasn’t cut enough and decided to become a lawn-mower.
Luckily for fans, this race is the start of a triple header. Hopefully this means that the next two races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia have more intrigue!