Winners and losers from F1’s pivotal Dutch Grand Prix

What looked like a straightforward one-stop race became an incident-filled event punctuated by several safety cars. Oscar Piastri kept his cool and collected a momentous win, while disaster befell his McLaren companion and title rival Lando Norris.

Meanwhile, several midfielders capitalised on the chaos to make it into the winners’ column…

Winner: Oscar Piastri

Oscar Piastri, McLaren

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro / LAT Images via Getty Images

Momentum may be overrated, but Oscar Piastri came out of the summer break swinging. The Australian looked second best to Norris for a good chunk of the weekend, but absorbed his team-mate’s data and applied it to find more lap time when it mattered, taking a slender 0.012s margin to deny the Briton a second consecutive Zandvoort pole.

As soon as Piastri emerged ahead of Norris and Max Verstappen out of Turn 1, he never looked like losing this one – with fewer strategic options for Norris to perform a smash and grab like in Hungary.

But what was looking like another McLaren 1-2 win – and thus another seven-point swing between its drivers – became what could well be the deciding moment of the 2025 title fight as Norris ground to a halt, his McLaren up in white smoke with seven laps to go.

Piastri is now firmly in control of the championship. If there are any indications that he might yet fumble this golden opportunity, we have yet to see them.

Loser: Lando Norris

Lando Norris, McLaren

Photo by: John Thys / AFP via Getty Images

Norris did his best to put on a brave face as he shuffled from one microphone to the next on Sunday night. It wasn’t his fault, nothing he could do, that’s racing. All true, yet it doesn’t change the tough situation he is now in as all the good work he did before the summer break to get back within striking distance of Piastri came undone in one fell swoop.

Norris indeed didn’t do a whole lot wrong in Zandvoort. He missed pole by 0.012s – a margin he blamed on a gust of wind – and on Sunday he was mobbed at the start by soft-tyre starter Max Verstappen start before repassing the Dutchman decisively – something his overtake attempts haven’t always been.

It has long become apparent that the fight between Norris and Piastri is decided by details. With the gap at 34 points, all those details will now have to start going Norris’ way. That means he must deliver a near perfect nine-race streak, something which he hasn’t been able to achieve yet. Team boss Andrea Stella suggested the underdog position might bring out the best version of Norris from now on. It will have to be.

Isack Hadjar, Racing Bulls

Photo by: Clive Rose / Getty Images

As the fight for Red Bull’s second 2026 seat starts ramping up, Hadjar kicked off the second part of the season in the best way possible by qualifying an outstanding fourth, a position he long looked like keeping as he batted away challenges from Mercedes’ George Russell and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

Hadjar was lucky to be bumped up to a maiden podium after Norris’ disaster, but it was a just reward both for the 20-year-old rookie’s faultless drive and for his occasionally giant-slaying squad, which is celebrating the sixth podium in its existence. The 20-year-old never looked out of place among a series of serial race winners, and at one point even looked like challenging Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.

Will the Dutchman be his next team-mate? As the weeks go by, Hadjar is becoming increasingly harder to overlook.

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari

Photo by: James Sutton / Motorsport Images

From sixth and seventh on the grid, Ferrari was never likely to be going anywhere. But what looked like a day to forget out of mediocrity became a day to erase from its memory out of ignominy.

As spots of light rain hit the track, Lewis Hamilton slid over the generously applied paint in the banked Turn 3, initially catching his slide but then understeering into the wall. As the Scuderia’s luck would have it, Hamilton’s accident particularly affected Charles Leclerc, who made a costly stop in green flag conditions while his rivals made a cheap stop behind the safety car.

In a bid to recover the position he lost to George Russell, Leclerc came in hot on the Mercedes driver and caused contact — which for reasons best known to race control couldn’t be investigated during the race. It kept Leclerc’s battle with Russell and the second Mercedes of Andrea Kimi Antonelli going.

Antonelli’s aggressive second pitstop for soft tyres achieved the desired effect, and lured Leclerc and Ferrari into covering the Italian off while unleashing Russell. That ultimately led to the pair coming to blows in Zandvoort’s cursed Turn 3. That was all on Antonelli and not Leclerc’s fault at all, but questions have to be asked whether Ferrari really should have responded to Antonelli at all or whether it should have just stuck to its guns and kept track position.

As Leclerc found a comfortable spot on a Dutch dune to watch the remainder of the race, thus concluded a day on which Ferrari didn’t cover itself in glory.

Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull Racing Team, Alexander Albon, Williams, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes

Photo by: Bryn Lennon / Formula 1 / Getty Images

Zandvoort had “boring one-stop” written all over it, but a cascade of crushed carbon fibre decided otherwise. Three safety car intervention gave teams sunk in the midfield a chance to make their own luck, and Williams was first in line for a big payday with Alex Albon.

Albon rued a rotten Q2 exit on Saturday as Williams continues to struggle to keep its Pirellis in the right temperature range in qualifying. But his climb from 15th to fifth wasn’t all down to luck and attrition, as the Anglo-Thai driver made a brilliant start and climbed to 10th by the end of lap 1. That put him in a position to pick up the bits and pieces, which turned out to be a generous heap.

As Carlos Sainz suffered a frustrating afternoon marred by contact with Liam Lawson, Albon saved the day and helped protect Williams’ fifth spot in the constructors’ table.

Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull Racing Team

Photo by: Kym Illman / Getty Images

Red Bull will surely make a careful decision on the identity of Verstappen’s 2026 team-mate based on data rather than emotion, but Hadjar’s breakthrough podium didn’t come at a great time for Yuki Tsunoda who, despite all the attrition, still only managed to score two points in a Red Bull.

That wasn’t all Tsunoda’s fault, as the timing of the first safety car meant he lost four positions. But if he starts qualifying in a better position, then he wouldn’t have the need to go “off-piste” with his race strategies. Yes, the Red Bull RB21 is difficult, but with the Japanese driver now on par with Verstappen in terms of car specification, he will have to be consistently closer to Verstappen in Q3. There were some glimpses of that happening before the summer break, but not in Zandvoort.

Tsunoda will still get a fair chance to prove himself, with no decision expected before the end of October, but the more Hadjar impresses the more Tsunoda’s position is looking perilous.

Oliver Bearman, Haas F1 Team, Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull Racing Team

Any day you end up in the points from a pitlane start is a good day’s work. Somehow, Oliver Bearman managed to find himself in sixth by the time the chequered flag waved.

It was a Hulkenbergesque recovery drive in which the Haas driver was genuinely fast, but would have been hopeless from a pitlane start without rolling the dice on strategy

Funnily enough, the first safety car actually worked against Bearman and his hard-tyre start, as it gave all the medium runners a cheap pitstop. But by staying out late, the young Briton then put himself in the position to be more fortunate the next time safety car driver Bernd Maylander was pressed into action.

Bearman said he was “desperate” for the result after an up and down campaign, in which he has made his fair share of rookie errors. His Zandvoort drive was as composed as they get.

Nico Hulkenberg, Sauber, Gabriel Bortoleto, Sauber

Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images

With Williams, Racing Bulls and Haas all scoring upwards of nine points, a scoreless afternoon for Sauber was painful in the context of a hard-fought midfield battle. Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto 14th and 15th, having seemingly always caught the wrong end of the stick as the three safety car interventions played out.

Hulkenberg suggested Sauber was too cautious and didn’t take enough risks, which was strange for a team that found success through boldness earlier this season and had nothing to lose after a disappointing qualifying session.

Bortoleto’s race was hampered by a poor getaway on lap 1, and his call to stay out on old hard tyres under the last safety car was ambitious but doomed to fail as he was passed left, right and centre.