A moment of genius, we all labelled it on Saturday, when Max Verstappen plucked one of the great qualifying laps from thin air.
But surely it could be nothing more than a moment. Surely it was impossible to make that pole stick across 53 laps of the race. Especially with two snarling McLarens, those papaya-coloured rocket ships, tattooed in his mirrors.
But the greatest driver of his generation doesn’t do flukes. Not even when his car is struggling and far from the strongest on the grid. Not even when he doesn’t have a team-mate at the front to provide some extra muscle. No need for that, anyway. Not when you drive in a different stratosphere to the rest.
This was a Max masterclass. Nerveless from the off, tunnel-vision until the chequered flag.
He did not put a foot wrong in claiming victory at today’s Japanese Grand Prix, a first win of 2025 sandwiching him between McLaren’s Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in the drivers’ standings.
It felt like an important day for the season too. The day a warning shot was fired. A reminder that, despite their superior car, McLaren are not going to have it all their own way. Not least when Verstappen is the challenger.
Max Verstappen won the Japanese Grand Prix with a masterclass performance at Suzuka
Lando Norris finished second and was unable to get ahead of Verstappen at any point
The duo endured drama coming out of the pits as Norris felt he had been forced off, while Verstappen shrugged off the claim
‘The two McLarens were pushing me very hard and it was a lot of fun out there,’ said the victor. ‘Not easy, of course, to manage the tyres but I’m incredibly happy. It started off quite tough this weekend, but we didn’t give up. We kept improving the car and today it was in its best form.
‘We still have work to do. But it does show that if we really nail everything, we can be up there.’
Was it, all things considered, his best weekend in a Red Bull? Perhaps. I’ll stick with the afternoon last season when he seemed to morph into some kind of amphibious being in Brazil, rising from 17th to top spot in the torrential rain at Interlagos. But this was certainly another win to tell the grandkids about.
Red Bull head honcho Christian Horner could only admire the work of his master craftsman. ‘We know the McLaren’s are very, very fast and it needed Max to be inch perfect,’ said Horner.
‘And for 53 laps he made not a single mistake and had the pace to cover them and keep them out of his DRS.
‘I think that’s one of Max’s best weekends that he’s had.’
The closest Norris, who finished second place, ever got was a brush with Verstappen in the pitlane. It almost ended in disaster for the Brit, who initially pointed the finger of blame at his rival. It felt like an act of desperation. Norris simply ran out of road.
He reflected: ‘It’s racing. He was still ahead, it squeezes into one and Max is the last guy to give me any space in a good way, in a racing way, nothing more than that.
Red Bull star Verstappen has moved to within a point of Norris in the Drivers’ Championship
Oscar Piastri (background) was making up ground on Norris towards the end McLaren did not want him to overtake
Lewis Hamilton came home in seventh for Ferrari after overtaking rookie Isack Hadjar
‘We tried some things. Maybe we could have tried a bit more with strategy. So some things we’ll discuss, but good points for us as a team. Decent points for me. Of course would have liked a little bit more but (you) have to take second sometimes.’
On the day, Norris opted to play the waiting game. As did the rest of the field, it felt like, during this processional affair. Not a spectacle to reward those who set their alarms for an unsightly hour back home in Blighty.
McLaren at least attempted to liven things up at the end of lap 18 by telling Norris to pit. Red Bull saw that call for what it was: a bluff.
But, three laps later, it was Verstappen who twisted first by pitting for a new set of rubbers. Norris went blow-for-blow, matching the move.
A fractional delay to Verstappen’s stop narrowed the gap. The pit exit was only ever going to be wide enough for one of them.
As Norris was released, Verstappen just managed to squeeze his nose in front. That forced the McLaren man into the agricultural option, bumping up onto the grass.
‘He forced me off,’ Norris protested. ‘He drove himself into the grass,’ Verstappen defended.
The Dutchman had every right to stand his ground. ‘I think the grass was not really well cut on the right-hand side. So I think Lando saw that and made sure that it was nicely cut,’ he joked post-race.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli got the fastest lap – no longer worth a point – and came sixth after leading the race when others had pitted
Yuki Tsunoda climbed two spots to 12th and said he was learning about his new car every lap
Liam Lawson dropped three spots to 17th from qualifying after being dropped by Red Bull
Norris was left to do his overtaking on the track instead. But that isn’t easy around this circuit, as he became painfully aware as the afternoon dragged on.
Instead, as Verstappen was ordered to put his foot down, Piastri emerged as the quicker of the two McLarens. ‘I think I have the pace to get Max,’ reckoned the Australian, on his 24th birthday.
But for any realistic chance of that, Piastri would’ve needed Verstappen to slip up.
It never seemed possible he would. Not from the moment Verstappen embarked on that qualifying lap from the gods.
