Lando Norris He won his seventh race this season – and the second in a row – and the eleventh in his career, all on different tracks, to remain at the top of the championship. Formula 1. However, he knows it too Max Verstappen He is a wounded lion, so this difference is 49 points over third place (24 ahead of the reduced one). Oscar Piastri5th in Interlagos) does not comfort him. Even more so after the Dutchman was the driver of the day by finishing third (and fighting for second place with… Kimi Antonelli to the end) after starting from the pitlane in a completely rebuilt Red Bull.
The English driver, who had the most points at stake of the weekend with the Sprint Race, finished ten seconds ahead and only lost the lead when he stopped to change tires on laps 31 and 51, but few looked at his excellent driving in the best car of the season.
The attraction was behind him, with the brilliant Verstappen. After a Friday in which he crawled around the track in a car without a beat – and was disqualified from Q1 after four years – the mechanics dismantled and rebuilt the car, which included a penalty that saw the four-time champion start last.
Race classification
A great ride completes a perfect weekend for Lando Norris #F1 #Brazil Race pic.twitter.com/g0yMt4stbU
– Formula 1 (@F1) November 9, 2025
But Interlagos is accustomed to the return of MadMax, who won the race last year after starting 17th. This time, it was not enough for him to imitate the epic but he managed to give an overtaking maneuver to George Russell on the 63rd lap that put the Brazilians in position on the grandstand on the main straight and move towards second place, which Antonelli defended until the end, explaining in Brazil why Toto Wolff chose him to replace Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes. If we talk about the seven-time champion, it cannot be ignored that Ferrari finished the race without its two cars for the first time since the Dutch Grand Prix, on August 31: Leclerc on the fifth lap, when in the restart after Bortoletto’s accident they tried to pass without success at the same time Piastri, Antonelli, Monaco and Hamilton on the 37th.
“Sometimes it’s hard to know everything with traffic and so on, but to be on the podium starting from the pits… I didn’t expect it at all, not even with a puncture at the start of the race. That’s why we had to go back to the pits. It’s an amazing result for us, so I’m very happy and very proud of the whole team,” said the No. 1 defender, who will likely feature in a Papaya car in the 2026 season. “There are a lot of points for a real chance to get, I think,” he admitted in Brazil.
“It’s a great victory, but honestly, after seeing how fast Max was, I’m very disappointed that we weren’t faster. That’s what’s on my mind now. There’s not much further to go, but I’m focused on myself: keep my head down, ignore everyone and keep going,” Norris warned. And in a fortnight’s time, a raid on three successive grand prix wins will begin to determine whether he can win his first Formula 1 title.
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