If you know someone who watches Formula 1, give them a hug.
It doesn’t matter which horse they backed on Sunday in the most intense title rivalry in years—challenger Max Verstappen or seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton. In the end, the result, victory and a maiden title for 24-year-old Dutchman Verstappen, was effectively decided by the race director.
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As the sun set on the Abu Dhabi circuit, Hamilton, 36, a Brit and the first and only Black driver to race in F1, was on the cusp of breaking Michael Schumacher’s record seven F1 championship titles. Before the season finale, Hamilton was cheered on by an impressive roster of supporters, from Malala Yousafzai to Anna Wintour to Justin Bieber.
Verstappen, the fast-rising Red Bull star and son of a former F1 driver, had the “orange army” behind him, named after the boisterous fans decked out in his country’s national color. No Dutch had ever won the championship.
On Sunday, for the first time since 1974, the two title contenders entered the final race of the season on the same number of points—that’s how closely Hamilton and Verstappen had fought each other in the last 21 races—meaning whoever crossed the finish line first would win it all.
But after one of the most competitive racing seasons in F1 history, the controversial ending left millions of motorsport fans shaking their heads in disbelief and disappointment.
Formula One is the pinnacle of auto racing, featuring fast cars and fearless drivers who push the machine to the limits of physics, sometimes fatally. But the sport was never just about who has the skill to drive the fastest, and the Sunday race was a textbook example of the myriad variables, some more fickle than others, that decide who comes out ahead.
First, for the uninitiated into the world of racing: F1 is not a so-called spec series, where everyone drives cars of identical specifications and winning comes down mostly to skills.
In F1, the performance of cars plays a huge role in race outcomes. In the 2021 season, for example, Hamilton’s team Mercedes and Verstappen’s Red Bull had indisputably the best cars. As a result, the two teams’ drivers were clearly ahead of everyone else, often lapping the backmarkers toward the end of races.
Second, you can’t talk about F1—or any motorsport racing, for the matter—without talking about tires.
Tires provide grip, and grip dictates how quickly a car could speed up or slow down to turn. The fact that the rubber wears down over the course of a 190-mile-long, 58-lap race means it’s necessary to change tires mid-race.
What tires to put on—soft rubber for better grip or hard rubber for durability—and when to do that are hence a significant part of any F1 race. A normal tire change costs about 25 seconds, including the time it takes to enter and exit the pit lane and the tightly choreographed act of putting on fresh tires itself. That’s an eternity, given that the top drivers are separated by much less time. But what drivers lose by pitting they make up for by being able to go faster in fresher, grippier tires.
The Sunday showdown was in part decided by tires. Hamilton used a one-pit strategy, betting that he could outpace Verstappen by spending less time in the pitlane and racing on slower but more durable tires. Verstappen, on the other hand, changed tires three times—the last one under lucky circumstances. (Well, more on that later.)
Third, F1 is a team sport. Each of the ten constructors has two drivers, who often work together to ensure the best outcomes for the team.
This can be done, for example, when one driver helps their teammate by backing up other cars. Red Bull’s Sergio Perez did that on Sunday when he skillfully blocked Hamilton, forcing him to go the long way and creating turbulence ahead of his car, thereby reducing the Mercedes’ pace and narrowing Hamilton’s lead on Verstappen.
On the other hand, Hamilton’s teammate, Valtteri Bottas, was too far behind to do anything about Verstappen.
Fourth, there are rules—and human judgments are involved in carrying them out.
Regulations matter in all sports, but they are perhaps especially important in F1, where drivers race at speeds of up to 215 miles (347 kilometers) per hour—literally faster than the takeoff speed of a Boeing 747 jetliner.
There are thousands of rules governing every aspect of a race. Aggressively cutting ahead of your rival could be penalized. Overtaking outside the track is forbidden, and whoever gained an advantage doing so must give it back.
And if a car breaks down on the track, race officials could deploy a safety car to the front of the pack, slowing down everyone to a safe speed until the obstruction is cleared. Crucially, this removes any gaps between drivers.
No overtaking is allowed during this period but the cars keep going and drivers are allowed to enter the pit to change their tires. Laps completed under safety car deployment still count as full laps.
Here’s where Verstappen got lucky and things got controversial.
Hamilton was comfortably in the lead in the 53rd lap of the 58-lap race, followed by Verstappen, when Williams’ Nicholas Latifi crashed into the barrier and brought out the safety car.
With only five laps to go, Hamilton stayed on the track with his old tires while Verstappen pitted for a fresh set of the quickest tires. Trackside marshals scrambled to remove Latifi’s damaged car and clear the debris on the track.
The Dutch driver rejoined the track behind Hamilton and, critically, several lapped cars, vehicles that are one lap behind the race leader. This was important because if the race resumed, despite his fresh tires, Verstappen would have to overtake the lapped cars before reaching Hamilton. With few laps to go, that seemed unlikely.
But decisively, F1 Race Director Michael Masi broke with convention and allowed those lapped cars to overtake the safety car and get out of the way of the title contenders, setting up a lopsided one-lap battle between Hamilton and Verstappen. Normally, all lapped cars, not just those in the front, would be allowed to unlap themselves, and the race would resume the following lap. But with time running out, following these steps would mean handing Hamilton a victory and ending the race behind a safety car—an unexciting conclusion to a highly anticipated finale.
The Red Bull driver, who had the advantage of racing on a new set of the fastest tires, easily overtook the Mercedes, effectively snatching the championship trophy away from Hamilton at the last minute and denying him a historic eighth title.
Mercedes protested the decision and entered an appeal process after race stewards dismissed its complaint. Masi defended himself saying that it was “highly desirable” for the race to end in normal conditions other than behind a safety car, “as it had long been agreed by all the teams.”
It’s a reminder that F1 racing is not just about who drives faster; it’s a spectacle, too.
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