Lando Norris sealed the constructors’ championship for McLaren by winning the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix ahead of Carlos Sainz Jnr and Charles Leclerc.
Norris led every lap of the season-ending race to take the final win of the season, securing the constructors’ title for his team.Sainz took second place while Leclerc recovered from 19th on the grid to take the final podium spot of the season in third. Lewis Hamilton caught and overtook Mercedes team mate George Russell on the final lap for fourth place in his last race for the team.
When the lights went out for the final time, the two McLarens approached the first corner still in order, with Norris ahead of Oscar Piastri. Max Verstappen got ahead of Carlos Sainz Jnr off the line and challenged Piastri for second place into the first corner, but hit the McLaren at the exit of the corner, sending both spinning and dropping towards the back.
At turn six, Valtteri Bottas made contact with Sergio Perez, spinning the Red Bull driver out of the race. While Bottas continued, Perez was too damaged to continue and pulled off track, resulting in a Virtual Safety Car.
The race resumed on lap three with Norris leading from Sainz, George Russell, Pierre Gasly and Nico Hulkenberg in fifth. Verstappen received a 10-second penalty for the turn one collision, with Bottas also penalised ten seconds for his clash with Perez. Piastri hit Franco Colapinto when the race restarted, earning him the same penalty.
Norris and Sainz pulled away from the rest of the field behind them, with Gasly holding third until he pitted on lap 14. Sainz maintained a gap of around three seconds to the leader ahead until he pitted at the end of lap 25, switching from mediums to hard tyres. Norris pitted on the next lap, but Sainz was now within two seconds of the leader after the benefit of an earlier lap on fresh tyres.
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Charles Leclerc, who had gained 11 positions on the opening lap, caught up to Russell and undercut the Mercedes when the pair pitted. Hamilton was the only driver to have started on hard tyres and ran until half distance before pitting for mediums from third place. That moved Leclerc up to third with Russell in fourth.
Hamilton pitted for medium tyres and rejoined in seventh. He overtook Nico Hulkenberg and Pierre Gasly to move up into fifth, then set about catching his team mate 14 seconds ahead.
Sainz dropped back slightly from Norris, who continued to lead comfortably over the second half of the race. Norris took the chequered flag to claim the victory and confirm McLaren as constructors’ champions for the first time since 1998.
Sainz finished just under six seconds behind in second, with Leclerc completing the podium having starting to the back of the grid. Hamilton overtook Russell at turn nine on the final lap to end his Mercedes chapter in fourth with Verstappen finishing sixth.
Gasly took seventh to confirm Alpine would beat Haas to sixth in the constructors’ championship, with Hulkenberg, Fernando Alonso and Piastri completing the points scoring positions.
Alongside Perez, Colapinto joined the Red Bull driver in retirement after a suspected power unit failure. Bottas’s time at Sauber and potentially in Formula 1 also came to an end when he hit Kevin Magnussen at turn six, leaving him with race-ending damage. Liam Lawson retired on the penultimate lap with a smoking RB.
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2024 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
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Edvaldo
8th December 2024, 14:48
See how easy it is? Start on pole, keep the lead = win. If you have the pace, that works most of the time.
Let’s see if he learned the lesson for next year.
Jere (@jerejj)
8th December 2024, 15:07
Third well-controlled victory for Lando after the Dutch & Singapore GPs, & a good way to end the season on a high, with perhaps the WDC awaiting next season like with Seb after the 2009 season finale.
Max’s move was simply over-optimistic from that distance, & Bottas was also clumsy with Checo, although he couldn’t do much about locking up alongside Magnussen.
VCARB will probably receive a financial sanction just like Williams in Imola.
Osnola
8th December 2024, 20:28
Optimistic indeed, but the most typical racing incident you can imagine in lap one.
Not sure if penaltys for these kind of actions make racing better.
SPArtacus
8th December 2024, 15:24
Surprised none of these first 6 articles have a final WDC or WCC standings table.
RedEaredRabbit (@redearedrabbit)
8th December 2024, 18:37
Call me nostalgic, but I did love the constructors’ title going down to the last race, between the two greatest teams in the history of the sport.
Congrats McLaren!
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
8th December 2024, 20:30
Yes, me too! And it was very interesting too, thanks to verstappen, who immediately took piastri out of contention and to leclerc, who had a super recovery, from 19th to 3rd, and he was already 8th on lap 2 or something like that!
If by any chance sainz had been quick enough to catch and overtake norris, they’d be at even points and ferrari could’ve won the title, so it’s not like norris could’ve taken it easy, it’s been a great battle.
And in the end, the team that didn’t win the title since longest, 26 years, won it, and they also happen to be those who had the overall best car this year.
MG1982 (@mg1982)
8th December 2024, 19:29
No big wonder. Ferrari had very small chances to overcome the deficit before this GP weekend anyway, after the Quali it became mission impossible. The chances drop from very small to impossible was their own fault tho. 1st – the team with the tech issues for LEC’s car, 2nd – LEC not qualifying for Q3. Given the gap between NOR and SAI at the end of the race (~ 6 seconds), I think LEC could have won this GP if started in top4. Ferrari must iron out at least some of these issues&mistakes. Without some of them, the WCC could have been theirs.
Osnola
8th December 2024, 20:35
Nice kind of last race tension.
Worrisome is the fact piastri again breaks under pressure. His colapinto action was very stupid and was lucky to keep things in one piece.
Norris did it as it should. Starting from pole and keeping the lead.
Nice action by lewis. He did the best he could under the circumstances.
Chaotic begin and lots of fighting during the race. I guess theres always room for improvement but the director showed a lot of the action.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
8th December 2024, 20:45
Yes, I’d really like to see an alternate scenario with leclerc starting ahead, he’s usually faster than sainz, though I’m not sure he’d make it, mclaren looked a bit faster.
An Sionnach
9th December 2024, 1:41
Looking good for Lando for next year. He’s got Oscar covered for in-race pace. I can’t see Oscar improving that much.
Storming from Leclerc. It’s great to see him with fire in his belly. He’s the non-world champion on the grid most worthy of one?
Monster drive from Lewis. The problem for them next year is that the Ferrari drivers will be reasonably evenly matched, but Lando will have little trouble from Oscar.
Mercedes somehow go into next season with what should be a competitive enough car, but they do not have a good enough driver. They need to fix this. I wonder would Alonso consider swapping with George? George has a lot of work to do on his race pace. Not as much as Oscar, but he’s a long way back. I would suggest that he can’t beat a number of the current grid in the same car. As excellent as he is in qualifying, doing one immense lap and then hanging on for dear life every other one is not what wins championships. Max would do, either.
It’s hard to criticise Max because he so often goes for an instinctive move and it somehow works. I think he needs to take it easier going into turn one. It looked on, didn’t work out and the penalty was a bit harsh, but he’d made a great start and should have had more patience. I think it’s good to penalise lap one incidents as a lot of drivers have gotten away with illegal moves in the past that were completely within their control. Not sure when they stopped waving them all away, exactly… inconsistent stewarding continues. If the form book remains relatively similar next year, a certain British driver may pick up a number of lap one penalties over the season. I won’t hold my breath…
I don’t see Red Bull troubling either championship next year unless they improve a lot.
Good drive from Carlos. He kept close to Norris.
Nice to see Alonso up there. Good to see more from him. Please, someone give him a competitive car. It’s a crying shame seeing so many winners this year, many of whom are inferior drivers. Perhaps he’s not going to change at this stage. The stuff with Lawson was petty and I don’t like it the way he covers for himself if he makes even a minor mistake. Who cares? Lewis makes mistakes and then almost negates them with a huge drive. A truly great driver like Prost would own up to his mistakes and then not make them again.
Strong drive from Lawson and good defending from Tsunoda. Not sure he didn’t just make some sort of elementary mistake, though.
Bottas was great in qualifying and then bungled the race. Not the first time, but perhaps it should be the last time? I’d go for Magnussen if I was looking for a Pérez replacement. Can drive the car during the race and is fierce in his rearguard actions. That’s what the team needs.
An Sionnach
9th December 2024, 8:28
Doohan looked wrecked after the race. He’s got to work on his fitness over the winter. Flavio will hardly leave him there the whole season unless he shows an improvement.