The podium at the Brazilian Grand Prix was spectacular: Lando Norris, the announced future world champion; Kimi Antonelli, the near-future champion; and Max Verstappen, the world champion everyone hopes to see crowned for the fifth time, each story transcending the results themselves.
Watching Antonelli race with such maturity was thrilling. He maintained the perfect pace, keeping just enough margin to fend off Verstappen’s final attack. Mercedes placed their bet on him after Hamilton’s departure, and finally the results are coming, even with a car that lacks the speed and efficiency of McLaren.
The paradox that highlights Antonelli’s talent is that he delivered his best performance on tracks he had never raced on before, where mistakes were always a risk. Interlagos leaves little room for error, yet Kimi—or Andrea, as we are still unsure which name he prefers—executed everything flawlessly. However, in Formula 1 nothing is ever easy. At the end of the race, he faced Charles Leclerc’s criticism over the Safety Car restart, when Antonelli defended his position from Piastri, causing the collision that left Charles out in a bad way.
It seems to me that Charles Leclerc might have exaggerated a bit, recalling Zandvoort, when Kimi had previously taken him out due to a clear misjudgment. This time, there was indeed space to avoid the incident, but Antonelli had to defend his position and could not have predicted that Oscar Piastri would dive inside with such a legal but optimistically reckless maneuver. I cannot hold him responsible for what happened, though the nuances could be debated endlessly.
Still, I understand Charles Leclerc’s frustration, intensified by the fact that in such a chaotic race he could have made his mark. Instead, Ferrari ended up scoreless, partly due to the chaos that also affected Lewis Hamilton. However, it should be noted that with a better qualifying, Hamilton could have avoided trouble and collisions. It is a tough moment for the F1 Scuderia, which looks enviously at Ferrari’s WEC team achieving world titles. The causes have been analyzed and discussed at length, but only President John Elkann, thrilled by endurance racing triumphs, could possibly make sense of it all; the rest is just words in the wind.
Regarding the championship, Lando Norris made a decisive move in Brazil: 33 points scored in two days against Oscar Piastri’s 10, showing Lando’s momentum and Oscar’s struggle. The gap is now 24 points, boosting Norris’s confidence while creating pressure for Oscar Piastri.
Mathematically, the one seemingly left out of contention is the strongest of all, Max Verstappen, who wrote another chapter of F1 history at Interlagos by finishing third after starting from the pit lane. The Red Bull transformation overnight between Saturday and Sunday was remarkable. The slow and disappointing car from qualifying turned into a missile, traveling at double the speed of the competition. That kind of leap, that happy reaction, is something Ferrari hasn’t delivered in recent years, stuck in the eternal fear of making mistakes. This is not just a technical issue but a question of mindset. It’s a discussion that goes far beyond the track—better to enjoy a good Brazilian cafesinho and think of something else…
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