The weekend started off with the unexpected conclusion to qualifying where Kevin Magnussen took Haas’s first pole position in F1 after a heavily disrupted Qualifying 3 where each driver was only able to set one lap in the dry due to a red flag caused by a spin from George Russell.

On Saturday the final sprint race of the season took place, 24 laps for the drivers to secure their position on the grid for Sunday. The sprint started with controversy as the two Alpines made brief contact as Fernando Alonso was forced off the track by his teammate, Esteban Ocon. Alonso then made contact with Ocon again, losing his front wing and forcing him to pit and lose positions. On Lap 3, World Champion Max Verstappen took the lead of the race as he passed Kevin Magnussen down the inside of turn 1. Russell, who started 3^rd on the grid, also passed Magnussen and his teammate, Lewis Hamilton, was making up some positions having started p8. More teammate politics occurred on lap 9 as Sebastian Vettel was forced off the track by Lance Stroll as the Canadian made a late move to the left as Vettel went for an overtake. On lap 13 Alex Albon retired after running over some debris, and on lap 15 George Russell overtook Verstappen for the lead of the race. Verstappen soon began to fall back, being overtaken by both Sainz and Hamilton a few laps later. The sprint concluded with George Russell taking the win, followed by Carlos Sainz and Russell’s Mercedes teammate, Lewis Hamilton. Sainz however, would take an engine penalty on Sunday making it a Mercedes 1-2 on the grid.

As the lights went out the two Mercedes managed to stay ahead of the Red Bulls and behind them, Lando Norris fought to get ahead of the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc. Norris’ teammate Daniel Ricciardo was involved in a battle of his own, though the result was not what he wanted, as he made contact with Saturday’s polesitter Kevin Magnussen after an attempted a move into turn 8. Magnussen was spun and began to free-wheel off the track to avoid the other drivers but hit Ricciardo again, causing them to both retire. A safety car was called out and the race was resumed 6 laps later. Russell had a great restart, immediately pulling away from his Mercedes teammate who found himself needing to defend from his former championship rival, and current World Champion, Max Verstappen. The two champs went wheel to wheel around turn 1 and they collided at turn 2 as Verstappen went down the inside of the Mercedes. This caused both drivers to fall back multiple positions and led to Verstappen pitting to change his front wing after it was damaged by the collision. The result of the accident was that of controversy as Verstappen was awarded a 5-second time penalty by the FIA for causing a collision. On the same lap, McLaren’s Lando Norris made contact with Charles Leclerc, sending the Ferrari into the barriers near turn 7. Norris was also given a time penalty.

Hamilton continued to make up positions after his incident, and by lap 45 he was back to p2 after overtaking Sergio Perez into turn 1. On lap 52 yellow flags were waved in sectors 2 and 3 as Lando Norris pulled over to retire his McLaren having lost power. This made it a double DNF for McLaren, something that they really could’ve done without, as they are still battling for p4 in the constructor’s championship with Alpine. This caused another safety car, but this time with no collisions on the restart. On lap 61, Carlos Sainz fought with Sergio Perez for the final spot on the podium, and 2 laps later Sainz finally got the made the overtake. At the same time Verstappen made an excellent double overtake into turn 1, passing Esteban Ocon and Valtteri Bottas to take p7. On lap 64 Sainz’s teammate Charles Leclerc also overtook Perez and on 65, Perez was passed by Fernando Alonso. Verstappen also overtook his teammate leading to a very controversial moment at the end of the race where the World Champion refused to follow team orders to let Perez by. As Max was unable to pass Alonso who was ahead, he was told to let Perez pass him as Perez was still fighting for p2 in the championship with Leclerc. Verstappen refused to do this, telling his engineer that he “gave his reasons and stand by it”, though his reasons have not been revealed to the public.

An exciting race resulted in victory for George Russell, his first win in Formula 1, and Mercedes’ first win this season. It was also a 1-2 finish for Mercedes, their first since 2020. The result seems promising for Mercedes and their fans as the other teams didn’t seem to get anywhere close to them, something they will want to continue with going into the final race in Abu Dhabi and next year. Though as we have seen, anything can happen and anything can change.