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Lando Norris insists he is much happier with his McLaren Formula 1 car than he was in China – despite being beaten to Japanese Grand Prix pole by Max Verstappen.The current championship leader bemoaned small margins for missing out on pole by 0.012 seconds at Suzuka as Verstappen surprisingly took the top spot ahead of both Norris and his McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri.Throughout the …Keep reading

Lengthy rain showers have been forecast for Suzuka overnight on Saturday and into Sunday, with the expected downpours set to halt the Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix grass fires.Five separate incidents of scorched turf have delayed track action across the weekend so far, with two red flags in FP2, two in FP3 and another during Q2 as the FIA and race organisers grappled with finding a …Keep reading

Williams driver Carlos Sainz has received a three-place grid penalty for Formula 1’s Japanese Grand Prix for impeding Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton in qualifying.Arriving at high speed into Turn 1 for his final flying lap in Q2, Hamilton encountered Sainz in the middle of the road, having to abort his lap and take avoiding action into the runoff area.Sainz said he had no warning that Hamilton …Keep reading

Max Verstappen has said Red Bull has not fixed its troublesome Formula 1 car despite taking a stunning Japanese Grand Prix pole that he called one of his finest career laps.The four-time world champion was bidding for his fourth consecutive pole at Suzuka, but balance issues with his 2025 Red Bull car combined with McLaren’s dominant form looked set to end that streak.But after not making …Keep reading

After every F1 qualifying session, Motorsport.com publishes each team’s qualifying record in terms of team-mate battles.This record is based exclusively on qualifying results so that grid penalties don’t alter the statistics.When a driver can’t put in a representative lap time due to a technical issue or an incident, this will be mentioned in the table.McLarenOscar …Keep reading

Max Verstappen stormed to a surprise pole position at the Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix as the reigning world champion defeated both McLarens to grab top spot.Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri had been setting the pace during practice, but it was Verstappen who delivered when it mattered, putting in a new track record of 1m26.983s to secure his fourth successive Suzuka pole.Early championship …Keep reading

Lando Norris closed out Japanese Grand Prix practice with the fastest time, just 0.026 seconds ahead of McLaren Formula 1 team-mate Oscar Piastri, as the session faced two red flags due to grass fires.The championship leader aborted two hot laps during his late-session qualifying simulations on soft tyres due to minor wide moments on the exit of the second Degner corner, but rallied on his …Keep reading

The NASCAR season kicked off this year with a race at the historic Bowman Gray Stadium, which had not seen a NASCAR Cup Series race since 1971. While the parking lot paddock behind the fieldhouse hearkened back to those early days of stock car racing, some 40-plus years before, the cars in the garage that day were far from those that might have been assembled in the backyard garages of the …Keep reading

“I think the people at Racing Bulls were a bit surprised themselves by the good car they’ve built this year,” Max Verstappen told reporters on Thursday at the Japanese Grand Prix.Two weeks ago in China, the world champion made it clear that his struggling team-mate Liam Lawson would be faster in the Racing Bulls car than in Red Bull’s RB21, mainly because the VCARB 02 is “easier to …Keep reading

Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso was left confused by his spin during second practice for the Japanese Grand Prix and suggested it may have been caused by a gust of wind. The Aston Martin driver lost control at the entry to Suzuka’s Turn 8 and spun across the gravel resulting in his AMR25 becoming beached with FP2’s second red-flag period subsequently happening. Alonso was the …Keep reading