Our writers pick their best drivers and favourite stories from 2025 – and who needs to improve in 2026

With a memorable 2025 campaign having now come to a close, it’s time to get our writers’ thoughts on the season gone by. From the best-performing drivers and strongest rookies through to the most shocking moments, we asked Lawrence Barretto, Chris Medland, David Tremayne and James Hinchcliffe for their take on all the big questions about the 2025 championship – as well as finding out who they think needs to up their game in 2026…

Who were the top five drivers in 2025?

Lawrence Barretto (F1 Correspondent & Presenter): There's no such thing as a free World Championship, so the fact Lando Norris found a way to beat a resurgent Max Verstappen and a very classy McLaren team mate in Oscar Piastri means, for me, he's the best driver in 2025 and thoroughly deserves his maiden championship. Verstappen and Piastri complete the podium, as they did in the drivers' standings. It's hard to argue with the next two spots either, as George Russell had his best year yet for Mercedes, scooping up two wins, while Charles Leclerc in P5 managed to get seven podiums with a Ferrari that looked like a real handful all year.

Chris Medland (Special Contributor): Max Verstappen, Oscar Piastri, Lando Norris, George Russell and Carlos Sainz.

Verstappen was an easy one for me, with only Barcelona standing out as a time he didn’t get everything out of a race weekend that he should have done. It’s a flip of a coin between the McLaren drivers, but I just go for Piastri over Norris based on the big step forward he made from year two to year three. Russell had a very strong year again, and then I spent ages picking between the Williams pair. Albon was so good for so long, and did outscore Sainz, but given it’s a new team for him and there were three top-three results in the end, the Spaniard slightly edges it.

David Tremayne (Hall of Fame F1 Journalist): Max Verstappen, George Russell, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, Charles Leclerc.

James Hinchcliffe (IndyCar Race Winner and Analyst): Lando Norris is an obvious one for this list. Delivered what was needed, when it was needed to secure the title. Max Verstappen mounted a comeback that was the stuff of legend. Before the Red Bull was even in the same conversation pace-wise, Verstappen kept himself just barely in touch with the lead duo through some outstanding performances. George Russell drove a championship-calibre season in a car that wasn’t his match. The inconsistency in the Mercedes package at times hid the consistently high level that Russell was performing at.

Carlos Sainz predicted pre-season that Williams would surprise people and that a podium was on the cards. I think he was being a bit facetious when he made those claims to F1’s digital team, but both did come true off the back of a stellar year for the Spaniard. Oscar Piastri was the title contender that few would have predicted would be in the fight in 2025. Yes, he had made big strides in 2024, but Norris still was top dog at the end of that season. Turn the page to 2025 and another gigantic leap in development made him not only a contender, but a favourite for much of the year. His struggles to adapt when his form dropped in the latter third will be what he focuses on this off-season, but if we know anything about Piastri it is that he is a very quick learner and will come back in 2026 stronger, faster and hungrier.

What was the best individual performance from 2025?

LB: That Max Verstappen was still in the title fight at the final race – and in with a genuine shot of a fifth straight crown – when he was previously 104 points adrift was remarkable and far and away the best individual performance of the season.

CM: If it has to be one race, then Max Verstappen’s recovery from the pit lane to third place in Brazil, but I’d also just count his entire second half of the season. Verstappen had to take every opportunity available to him, and the points he scored in Brazil prevented him from losing too much ground to Norris, which was crucial in keeping the pressure on given how the next three races played out.

DT: Max and Red Bull coming back from a 104-point deficit and finishing only two points off a fifth consecutive World Championship. By any standard that was a massive achievement from the best driver currently out there. Max is bulletproof and thinks only of how to win, and Red Bull’s engineers have an incredible will to win and ability to massage their cars – well, Max’s, at least – into winners despite their apparent shortcomings. Never say die, never give up lies at the heart of F1 racing.

JH: This is always a tough one in a 24-race calendar with 20 of the best in the world on track, but Verstappen’s drive from pit lane to podium in Brazil was absolutely sublime. His 2024 triumph at the same track was impressive, but there is no doubt the Safety Car helped the cause. This year, not only did he not have a Safety Car to help, he had a puncture which hampered his progress early. Without that, there is every chance that he wins that race from the pits.

What was your favourite story from 2025?

LB: Nico Hulkenberg's maiden podium at Silverstone, which came at the 239th time of asking. The German has been reborn in this second chapter of his career and has shown enough talent and pace consistently through 15 years in the sport that it would have been unfair if he never had the chance to taste the bubbles on a Formula 1 podium. He righted that wrong with a masterful drive at a soaking Silverstone.

CM: Nico Hulkenberg’s podium at Silverstone. This and Verstappen’s performance above are basically interchangeable, but more than just the drive that Hulkenberg delivered being special, it was the overall reaction from the rest of the paddock to see him finally in the top three. It was also a first Sauber podium in 13 years, and a real feel-good moment in the year that it felt like every team member and every fan loved to see.

DT: McLaren doing the double. They were up against a team that had to focus on only one driver, while Zak Brown and Andrea Stella generally did their utmost to play fair between their two (Monza apart, perhaps) by employing their now ‘famous’ Papaya Rules. We should be grateful for their sportsmanship insofar as they let Lando and Oscar race rather than favouring one over the other the way that Ferrari used to with Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello.

JH: I think the Norris character arc over the season was phenomenal. Comes in as a title favourite, starts strong before losing form and being written off, only to recover the form and reward himself and everyone that’s in his bubble with the biggest reward in racing. And he did it “Lando’s way”. Throw in emotional wins at Monaco and his home race at Silverstone and you pretty much have the fairytale written.

What shocked you most in 2025?

LB: Williams. I expected this to be a transitional year for the team, given a lot of a focus was put on medium- and long-term projects to strengthen the team's foundation and prepare them to be able to fight at the front consistently in the future. And yet they were brilliant this year and deservedly P5 in the Teams' Championship. Alex Albon was awesome for the first two-thirds of the season, while Carlos Sainz proved why he is so highly-rated with a superb second-half of the campaign that yielded not one but two podiums.

CM: The points that everyone scored. The driver finishing in 19th place in the standings had 19 points to their name, while from a team perspective, 70 points would have got you a top-six Constructors’ finish last year but was only good enough for ninth this year. Every driver to complete the season (so not counting the Alpine seat shared between Franco Colapinto and Jack Doohan) scored a top-six finish at some stage, and the field spread was ridiculously close at times.

DT: Lewis Hamilton's performances at Ferrari. Look at China, where he started the Sprint from pole and won, easily outpacing Oscar and Max, and it looked as if he’d made a super-smooth transition. But the manner in which his season steadily came unglued suggested that all was not well and that his copious suggestions on how to improve the recalcitrant SF-25 were falling on deaf ears.

And that weird McLaren strategy call under the Safety Car in Qatar. And Christian Horner's Red Bull departure after 124 victories, 287 podiums and 14 World Championships.

JH: The intense competitiveness of the midfield was a surprise in 2025, but the biggest shock is still the performance of Williams. Abandoned their development on 2025 as early as anyone, publicly accepting that it would be a year to suffer through to help make 2026 better, and in the hands of two incredibly fast and experienced drivers went on to take their highest Teams’ position since 2017 and have both drivers in the top 10 in points, with two podiums to their name.

Who was your rookie of the year in 2025?

LB: Kimi Antonelli. The Italian was thrown in at the deep end at Mercedes and, while he had a bumpy stint through the European leg of the calendar, he delivered on the expectation heaped on his shoulders from himself, the team and the whole of Italy. The way he responded to comments from boss Toto Wolff in Monza that his performance was "underwhelming" was outstanding, and he finished the season giving highly-rated team mate George Russell a real run for his money.

CM: Kimi Antonelli. I think Isack Hadjar surprised people and is a very close second for me, but in terms of the level of expectation, the benchmark they were up against and the development through the year, Antonelli impressed me slightly more. The mid-season struggles were a clear low point, but he found a way to turn that around and over the final five rounds all but matched Russell, while delivering some outstanding weekends like Brazil.

DT: I can’t really separate Kimi Antonelli and Isack Hadjar.

The Italian was better placed in some ways, being in a Mercedes, but it took him a while to get it all together even after his first podium in Canada. After a deep intra-team discussion and reset in Monza he was hugely impressive thereafter, sometimes outqualifying and outracing George (a feat in itself!). And keeping a charging Max, of all people, behind him in Brazil speaks volumes for his improvement, and his future. My prediction that he would win a race didn’t quite come off, but it will in 2026 if the Merc W17 lives up to expectations.

The sight of Isack weeping after falling off before the race even started in Melbourne was not something that we saw repeated. Instead, he gathered himself together admirably, and thereafter fully justified a critical Helmut Marko’s faith in his ability. The Racing Bulls VCARB 02 was obviously a decent car, and he used it extremely well, driving with great speed and confidence and generally steering clear of trouble, That podium at Zandvoort was excellent, and I can’t wait to see how 'Le Petit Prost' stacks up against Max chez Red Bull in 2026.

JH: This was a very tough class in 2025, but for me the nod goes to Ollie Bearman. There are great cases for Bortoleto, Hadjar and Antonelli, too, but after some early rookie errors Bearman’s form was mighty impressive. The car’s relative performance would fluctuate week to week, but that didn’t stop him from having the longest points scoring run in the team’s history, matching the Haas team’s best-ever finishing position in a race, and outqualifying and outscoring race winning team mate Esteban Ocon over the season.

Who needs to do better in 2026?

LB: Ferrari. The Scuderia were in contention to win a first Teams' Championship since 2008 all the way to the final race in 2024, but failed to build on that momentum this year and endured a win-less season as they faded to P4. They must be better in 2026.

CM: Ferrari. Easily could have been what shocked me most this year too, but I didn’t want to repeat answers! I fully expected a title challenge alongside McLaren given where both teams ended 2024, but Ferrari failed to progress. That led to a tough environment for Lewis Hamilton, but I think he’ll naturally be stronger if the car is, too. I did not have a win-less year on my radar this season – even mid-year – and I’d almost go as far as to say Ferrari can’t afford a repeat.

DT: Everyone, of course. But specifically, Ferrari. Their performance through much of 2025 was disappointing. Having been the fastest in the final races of 2024 they gave Charles a modified car that he always had to overdrive and Lewis one with which he just didn’t click. It’s now 17 years since the Scuderia won a World Championship, a completely unacceptable drought for such a well-funded team.

JH: Ferrari. No two ways about it. Charles Leclerc did his part to salvage the odd result, but the car and the team need to be better next season. Lewis Hamilton’s season was tough to watch, and much work needs to be done internally to get the seven-time champ to a place where he can perform at his best. The odd time the car was to his liking, we saw flashes of old Lewis, but from top to bottom big leaps are needed. 2026 offers a huge opportunity for the Scuderia, but should they fall short of expectations I would imagine a very different-looking Ferrari by 2027.