🏁 Norris Tops Verstappen to Take Early-season Lead at Albert Park

Lando Norris converted pole position into a hard-fought win during the 2025 season-opening Australian Grand Prix, which featured mixed weather conditions, multiple crashes, Safety Cars and a late-race downpour that caused huge drama.

Top Point Drives of the Race

🇮🇹 Andrea Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) • 37 points • F1 debut 4th place from an eighth-row qualification
🇬🇧 Lando Norris (McLaren Mercedes) • 28 points • a sweep of qualifying, race and fastest lap
🇳🇱 Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing RBPT) • 24 points • a second-place finish from P3

Our Game

Prizes

I failed to mention earlier that with a record-tying 11 players, we are playing for a top prize of $55.00, with additional prizes from 2nd-4th place of $27.50, $16.50 and $11.00. With 24 Grands Prix scheduled for 2025, taking us into December, our prize winners will have earned them!

Rule Changes

Those remembering the rain-delayed qualifying of the São Paulo Grand Prix in 2024 may also recall my promise to codify the ad hoc decision I made at the time, that being to use whatever the most recent competitive driving result was available in place of a published Starting Grid for generating a Prediction Form. On that weekend, the Form was based on the weekend’s Sprint Race; I have added the season’s Driver standings as a fall-back to cover GP weekends without a Sprint Race.

Additionally, I have cleaned up the Form submission deadlines for Grands Prix where the Form Submission takes place the same day as the race. The submission deadlines will be an easy-to-remember 2 hours in such cases. (By the way, it’s been 3 years now since F1 moved their start times back ten minutes to start on the hour.)

You will find these changes noted in the Rules.

The Race!

Andy’s debut in our game could not have gone any better for him as he earned a perfect score, predicting the better driver in all eight scoring rows. Doug and Steve find themselves in prize spots just as they finished last season, alongside Michael.

Standings

Through 1 🇦🇺 Australian Grand Prix
1	Andy Watson	168
2	Doug Wansbrough	152
	Michael Poplawski	152
4	Steve Nicks	144
	Wes Zetaruk	144
6	John Lo	129
7	Matt Belanger	128
	Richard Owens	128
9	Danielle Bourgeois	125
10	John Havlik	104
11	Deanna Nicks	101