Antonelli won the Miami Grand Prix from pole, 3.264 s ahead of Norris, with Piastri third. Pole to win, but not pole to flag: Antonelli led 30 of the 57 laps, Norris 15, Leclerc 11 and Verstappen one. The race between the first two was settled in three laps around the pit stops. In the 29 laps after them, Norris never got closer than 0.7 s.
Race trace, full race: every driver's position, lap by lap.
Leclerc first, then Norris
Antonelli took pole in 1:27.798, 0.166 s ahead of Verstappen. Leclerc, third on the grid, led at the end of lap 1 with Antonelli 1.1 s behind; Verstappen was ninth. Gasly and Hadjar were out on lap 4, Lawson on lap 6 and Hülkenberg on lap 7, recovery vehicles went to Turns 14 and 17, and the Safety Car ran from lap 6 to lap 11. Verstappen was the only front-runner to stop under it, for hards.
Norris took the lead on lap 13 with Antonelli second, and the two stayed in that order for 15 laps, Antonelli between 1.0 and 3.1 s behind. Their pace was nearly identical: from lap 14 to lap 25 the median lap was 1:33.044 for Norris and 1:33.109 for Antonelli. Neither could make a difference on track.
One lap earlier
After lap 25 Antonelli was 2.1 s behind. Mercedes brought him in at the end of lap 26 for hards; McLaren brought Norris in a lap later for the same tyre. Both in-laps were about five seconds off their normal pace. The difference was the lap after: while Norris was on his out-lap, 1:47.153 including the pit lane, Antonelli was on his first full lap on new hards, 1:32.914. He also spent 0.5 s less in the pit lane, 22.050 s against 22.552 s.
At the end of lap 28, both stops made, Antonelli was 0.177 s ahead. The stop sequence had gained him 2.3 s. Verstappen, on hards since the Safety Car, led that lap; on lap 29 both went past him, Antonelli first.
Twenty-nine laps inside three seconds
Norris had the whole second half to undo it, and was quick enough to keep the pressure on but not to pass. From lap 30 to the flag Antonelli's median lap was 1:32.366 and Norris's 1:32.413; Norris was the quicker of the two on 9 of those 28 laps. He set the fastest lap of the race on lap 35, 1:31.869, and was 0.706 s behind after lap 38, the closest he got. After that the gap settled at around 2 s and was 3.264 s at the flag. Our data does not show why McLaren waited a lap, only that the lap was worth about 2 s, and that 2 s was enough.
Verstappen's 51 laps, Leclerc's last one
Verstappen ran the longest stint of the race, hards from lap 7 to the flag, 51 laps. He rejoined 16th, was third by lap 27 as the others stopped, and held third for 18 laps after leading lap 28. From lap 47 the set was done: his laps were 1:33.6 to 1:35.9 while the cars around him ran 1:32s. Leclerc passed him on lap 47, Piastri on lap 48 and Russell on the last lap.
Piastri, seventh on the grid, stopped last of the top four, on lap 28, and came through on fresher hards, passing Leclerc for third on lap 56. Leclerc's last lap took 1:49.834, more than 15 s slower than any lap he had run before it, and Russell and Verstappen went by; he crossed the line sixth. Race Control listed last-lap incidents for investigation after the race, among them Leclerc and Russell at Turn 17 and Verstappen and Russell at Turn 1. In the final classification Verstappen's time is 5 s higher than at the line, still fifth, and Leclerc's 20 s higher, eighth behind Hamilton and Colapinto. Russell finished fourth.
Saturday the other way round
The sprint had gone to Norris. He took sprint pole by 0.222 s from Antonelli and led from start to finish on one set of mediums, 3.766 s ahead of Piastri, with Leclerc third. Antonelli fell from second to fourth on the opening laps and finished sixth. On Sunday the roles were swapped: Antonelli in front, Norris the one looking for a way past.
What decided it
Two cars on the same tyres at nearly the same pace, separated by one lap of pit timing. Antonelli's earlier stop turned a 2.1 s deficit into a lead, and he was quick enough to keep Norris behind for the 29 laps that followed. It is the third Grand Prix win of his career, and after four rounds he leads the drivers' championship on 100 points, 20 ahead of his teammate Russell.