Formula One Vault

PRIXVIEW – Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

Round twenty-four brings the season to a close and decides the championship, in the twilight of Yas Island and the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Since joining the calendar in 2009, it has become the traditional season closer, hosting it all but twice, the 3.281-mile circuit was introduced in 2021. The race was the sport’s first twilight race, somewhat poetic as the sun sets on the 75^th world championship.

This makes FP1 and FP3 aren’t the most representative sessions taking place under the sun, while conditions will cool in the late afternoon/evening sessions.

The current 3.281-mile was introduced in 2021 with the hairpin at Turn Five being revised and dramatic changes at the end of the second sector, the series of right-angled corners were removed and replaced by a banked sweeping corner which played its role in the controversial title decider, Lewis Hamilton was unable to re-pass Max Verstappen on the restart and that allowed the dutchman to take the lead and title.

The circuit winds its way around the marina and under a hotel with Ferrari World to one end, which contains Formula Rossa, the fastest rollercoaster in the world. Yas Island is a mix of theme parks, malls and concert venues which host the post-race concert, hotels, including one which was the first hotel in world to be built over an F1 race circuit.

Yas Marina has always tended to suit that years’ constructors’ champions, this is largely because of long straights, but yet on the old configuration, the stop-start nature of the final sector has been changed, meaning it’s no longer about good stopping acceleration into the ninety-degree corners. Though before the 2021 changes, there has been improvements to try and increase overtaking.

The current 3.281-mile was introduced in 2021 with the hairpin at Turn Five being revised and dramatic changes at the end of the second sector, the series of right-angled corners were removed and replaced by a banked sweeping corner which played its role in the controversial title decider, Lewis Hamilton was unable to re-pass Max Verstappen on the restart and that allowed the dutchman to take the lead and title.

For the first time since 2021, the championship goes down to fifty-eight laps around Yas Island. Lando Norris will be the favourite with a podium or ahead of Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen, his easiest way to a maiden championship crown, but McLaren admitted they got their strategy wrong in Lusail.

One of the most famous races and one which highlighted one of the issues with the previous configuration was in 2010. Vettel, Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso and Mark Webber went into the final race all mathematically able to win the title.

Vettel took pole ahead of Hamilton and Alonso. The Red Bull driver converted pole into the lead and retained it following the restart and then controlled the lead. Alonso and Mark Webber became stuck behind the Renault of Vitaly Petrov, allowing Hamilton to close the gap, despite being on heavily worn option tyres compared to the fresher, hard tyres of Alonso and Webber.

The stalemate continued for much of the middle part of the race, and with sixteen laps to go, Button released Vettel, Hamilton and Robert Kubica pulling away from the Englishman. A few laps later, Button released Vettel who had a twelve-second lead over Robert Kubica re-joining in fourth.

In clean air, Hamilton set the race’s fastest lap on lap forty-seven, as he closed slightly on Vettel. No further passing attempts were made on track, and thus, Vettel led the race to the end, to take his fifth win of the season. The McLarens of Hamilton and Button, who was knocked out of the title race in Brazil, completed the podium. Vettel took the title, having not led the championship all season, beating Alonso by four points.

The beginning of the hybrid era saw the start of the domination of Mercedes, the 2014 race putting Hamilton up against teammate Nico Rosberg for the title. However, while the build-up as been dominated by the title battle, it unravelled early on when Hamilton pulled away, and around half distance, Rosberg developed an ERS issue

That led to the Germans dropping down the field, while Hamilton cautiously made gains and went on to win the race. Rosberg finished outside the points while Hamilton went on to win the race by two and a half seconds. Much was made of the decision to award double points for the final race it didn’t matter in the end.

Mercedes set two new records, the first being 701 total points, the second being the margin of 296 points to second-placed Red Bull. This highlighted that Yas Marina is a circuit similar to Monza statistically in favouring the cars which are good in a straight line and good in the corners.

Mercedes dominated at Yas Marina in the hybrid era with Hamilton taking four wins in six years and teammates Nico Rosberg in 2016 and Valtteri Bottas in 2017. But it wasn’t the end to the season Mercedes wanted in 2016. Hamilton tried to allow Vettel and Verstappen through in the closing lap backing them up so they could pass Rosberg and knock him off the podium, so he could seal the championship.

2020 saw Mercedes’ dominance of Yas Marina broken by Verstappen, the Dutchman led every lap from pole taking Red Bull’s first win since 2013 in Abu Dhabi. This was the only pole position of the season achieved by a car not powered by a Mercedes engine and the first time since 2013 that Mercedes have not taken pole at the Yas Marina Circuit.

Verstappen went on to win the race ahead of Bottas and Hamilton.

2021 was the scene of the most controversial championship deciders, end to the season and races of all time, Hamilton and Verstappen had tied on points in Jeddah, meaning whoever finished higher would be champion. Hamilton led most of the race but when the Williams of Nicolas Latifi crashed with five laps to go, bringing out the safety car. Red Bull reached, bringing the Dutchman in switching him to new tyres, while Mercedes decided not to pit Hamilton, fearing losing the lead to Verstappen.

With a lap remaining, Verstappen’s tyre advantage saw him pass Hamilton at the hairpin, thus controversially taking the title. An immediate protest was launched along with an inquiry into the final five laps. The restart Mercedes protested as the normal rules of unlapping lapped cars weren’t followed. In almost Hollywood ending, the seven-time champion looked to be on course for his eighth title.

The bewilderment swept the drivers, teams, media and fans, several accusations against race director Michael Masi for not applying the rules correctly, and Hamilton saying, “this has been manipulated.” Several analysts stated that Masi’s decision had a direct bearing on the championship results.

2022 saw Verstappen dominate from pole despite an  “up and down” qualifying with a few issues, with him eventually unlocking performance to take pole. Charles Leclerc was a tenth and a half ahead of his Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz, the Monacan four-hundredths of a second behind Perez.

He then dominated the race to take his sixteenth win of the season, finishing eight seconds ahead of his championship rival Charles Leclerc. The Red Bull driver never looked back after pulling away and then controlling the race from the start as Leclerc passed Sergio Perez to seal the runners-up spot.

2023 Verstappen once again beat Leclerc to pole despite struggling in practice. He went on to take his nineteenth win of the season by seventeen seconds, which really sums up the season. Leclerc was second after being fended off by the Dutchman on the opening lap of the race before winning the race. Russell took third and teammate Hamilton ninth

Race & Circuit Guide

Championship Deciding Factors

• If Lando Norris finishes first, second or third in Abu Dhabi, he will win the world championship – it doesn’t matter where his rivals finish.
• If Norris doesn’t finish on the podium but does finish ahead of both Verstappen and Piastri, then he wins the title.
• Any other scenario for Norris to win the championship requires him to finish within 16 points of Verstappen and Piastri.
• Max Verstappen’s clearest route to the title is for him to win in Abu Dhabi and Norris to finish fourth or worse.
• If he does not win the race, he needs to out-score Norris by at least 13 points while also ensuring Piastri does not out-score him by five points or more.
• Piastri wins in Abu Dhabi, and Norris finishes sixth or worse, then Piastri wins the title.
• However, if Piastri finishes second, Norris would need to finish in 10th place or worse and Verstappen fourth or worse for him to win the title.
• Any other scenario for Piastri to win the title requires him to finish 17 points ahead of Norris and five points ahead of Verstappen.

Event timetable

What happened in 2024?

FP1 was topped by Charles Leclerc with a 24.321 on the soft tyres, which put him two-tenths faster than Lando Norris, but after a battery change will take a ten-place grid penalty. He was fastest despite losing much of the first half of the session because of the battery issue, but was soon up to pace with him going fastest. Lewis Hamilton was third, the seven-time champion was a quarter of a second behind Norris and ahead of teammate George Russell by just under half a second.

FP2 was the more important session given this is a twilight race, Norris topped the times with a 23.517 going over two-tenths faster than his McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri. The team looked strong with their biggest rivals, Ferrari six-tenths off with Carlos Sainz in fourth over a tenth behind Nico Hulkenberg

Qualifying saw McLaren’s pace continue Norris beating his teammate Piastri by two-tenths to take pole ahead of Sainz. Ferrari only managed to get one car into Q3 and was given an added blow, a ten place grid penalty for Leclerc because of an engine change, dropping him to nineteenth. Hulkenberg had a brilliant qualifying, putting his Haas fourth seven hundredths behind Sainz, his best qualifying since Sao Paulo in 2010 and the team’s best of the season

Norris has beaten both Ferraris to clinch McLaren the constructor’s championship for the first time in twenty-six years with a five-second victory. The Englishman drove a beautiful race to finish comfortably ahead although his teammate Piastri was taken out of the battle for victory following a collision with Max Verstappen, which dropped him to last.

Norris appeared unfazed by the drama and the added pressure on his shoulders knowing that he now needed victory to seal the constructors’, and soon started pulling away from the two Ferrari’s boldly throwing down a statement for 2025 to go after the drivers’ championship.

Leclerc had a brilliant race as he recovered from nineteenth to finish third after some brilliant overtakes early on, trying to do his bit to try and help Ferrari claim the constructors. But Ferrari never looked to have the pace to challenge Norris and deny McLaren the constructors, as well as confirming Norris as runner-up in the championship and sealing the Hawthorn Memorial Trophy as the highest British or Commonwealth driver in the championship.

Championship Standings

What to watch for?

McLaren, you have to say made hindsight a huge error on strategy in Doha on Sunday by not following what became the strategy chosen by all the other teams and that ultimately allowed Max Verstappen to overtake them at the final stop. They admitted they cost Lando Norris the opportunity to seal his first title; however, it did increase his lead slightly.

Norris needs to outscore Verstappen and teammate by sixteen points; he only needs a podium though other ways are dependent on results going his way. I think that, though they lost the race in Lusail without the strategy error and mandated stint lengths, they were comfortably able to win the race. It’s probably the only strategic error we have seen by McLaren, barring team orders and driver error this season.

They need to make a big and hard decision; do they throw the ‘paypa rules’ out the window to help Norris or risk losing the championship to Verstappen? I think they aren’t going to do that as they always have wanted it to be as fair as possible. Piastri could intervene, play the team game and ‘give up’ his championship fight, but this isn’t a position they should be in given their advantage this season.

Yas Marina should favour McLaren, with the first two sectors being made up of long straights and fast-flowing corners that should give them a bit of advantage once again, but they can’t mess up their strategy. The race can be difficult to overtake, but we have seen that improve since 2021, like the redesigned entry into the Marina being a good opportunity for overtaking.

This race will be about whether McLaren can get it right after the mess up I feel much of the build-up this week will be about that. They and all the teams need to be careful, fatigue at the end of a triple header and a long season can have an impact and that can lead to mistakes and reactions could be key.

The main battle is for third in the constructors; Red Bull are just five points ahead of Ferrari, and Ferrari finishing third would be a decent result in what has been a difficult season and potentially a Grand Prix-winless year. But this surprises me, and it’s partly also because Verstappen has scored most of Red Bull’s points.

For all the drivers and teams, this being the final race of the year, want a good weekend to end the season. But it’s only when we get time to reflect on the season that we will only then be able to say who the winners and losers are

2024 vs 2023 Race Data

2024 Lap time comparison

Tyres