Verstappen victorious in Suzuka

Max Verstappen claims his first win of the season, and his 4th win in a row at the Japanese Grand Prix. With this victory, he is now only 1 point behind championship leader Lando Norris. It was a relatively calm Japanese Grand Prix as there were very little overtaking throughout the race. On the opening lap, the Sauber of Gabriel Bortoletto fell from 17th to 20th as he struggled to find grip on the hard compound tires.

Further later, on lap 6, Lewis Hamilton gets by the Racing Bulls of Isack Hadjar down the main straight moving up into the 7th position. On lap 22, Both Verstappen and Norris made their pit stops to go to the end of the grand prix but as both of them were leaving the pitlane they saw themselves side by side with each other with Norris getting into the grass at the pit exit, with Verstappen keeping the lead. Norris immediately came over the radio to his team and said "He forced me off" with his team responding "yeah, we're on it". Verstappen on the other hand stated "He drove himself into the grass". Although the incident was looked at, there was no further action.

In addition, there seemed to be controversy later in the race. On lap 42, Oscar Piastri came over the radio and said to his team "If Lando is still saving, I think he should go soon. I think I have the pace to get Max". With very little laps left in the race, Piastri suggested to the team that himself and Norris should swap positions so that he could try and challenge Max Verstappen for the win.

However, McLaren did not swap Norris and Piastri and the pace from Norris was not enough to catch Verstappen for the win. With Max winning the Japanese Grand Prix, not only this is his first win of the season but also his 4th win in a row at the Suzuka circuit. To make it even more special, Verstappen wins in Honda colors as Red Bull decided to race with an all red and white livery for the Japanese Grand Prix as this is Honda's last season with Red Bull as they will be moving to Aston Martin in 2026. Red Bull had previously raced with a special Honda tribute livery back in 2021 but, due to Covid-19 at the time, Formula 1 was not able to race in Suzuka and instead the special livery was raced at the Turkish Grand Prix in Istanbul Park.

Vertsappen is now only 1 point behind Lando Norris for the lead of the championship heading into the Bahrain Grand Prix. Further down the field in P6 was Kimi Antonelli setting the fastest lap of the race with a time of 1:30.965 set on lap 50, becoming the youngest driver in Formula 1 to set the fastest lap during a grand prix. Antonelli also sets the record for becoming the youngest driver to lead a Formula 1 grand prix at 18 years, and 224 days old previously set by Max Verstappen at 18 years and 228 days in 2016 old as Antonelli lead for 10 laps earlier in the race. Racing Bulls driver Isack Hadjar scores his first career points in Formula 1 with a finish of 8th.

After the race, there were discussions in the paddock whether or not McLaren played it too safe with the strategy on not swapping the positions of Piastri and Norris.

There were debates going on with some saying McLaren should have let Piastri try to attack Verstappen for the win since he did have quicker pace than Norris in the closing laps but, if Piastri was not able to pass Max for the win, he would give the place back to Norris. Others brought up if there was a late safety car, it would have been a lot more difficult for McLaren on deciding what to do with their drivers.