The lights go out late, but the stakes are very real. Qatar opens the final double-header of the season with Formula 1 and Formula 2 sharing the Lusail stage, three nights in a row under floodlights and desert haze.
Weekend Breakdown: Qatar GP 2025 Schedule and Session Times
All track action runs in the late afternoon or evening local time, when temperatures drop but never fully cool.
Circuit Guide: Lusail Layout, Overtaking Zones and Key Corners
The Lusail International Circuit, home of Qatar GP 2025, is 5.419 kilometres long with 16 corners and 57 laps on Sunday’s race distance.
Almost all of those corners are medium or high speed. The only real “slow” complex is the left–right section at Turns 6 and 7, where traction matters. The rest of the lap flows in long arcs that load the front tyres and test confidence in the car’s floor.
The kilometre-long main straight dominates the racing. It ends in a heavy braking zone at Turn 1, fed by DRS, so it is the primary passing point. The final corner is key: drivers must launch from there with almost no steering angle if they want a shot at an overtake into Turn 1.
For F2, the same traits apply but the balance shifts slightly. Dirty air in the long corners bites harder, so qualifying position becomes even more precious.
Race lap records by each series:
- F1 – 1:34.876 – Lando Norris (McLaren) – 2024
- F2 – 1:35.115 – Paul Aron (Hitech Pulse-Eight) – 2024
Weather and Track Conditions at Qatar GP 2025
Friday — November 28
F1 impact
FP1 runs in late afternoon heat. Track temperature will sit in the low-30s, with strong solar load. The surface will feel green and dusty at first as wind drags fine sand onto the racing line.Teams will focus on race runs and front-tyre protection. Lusail still punishes the front-left in long corners.
Sprint Qualifying happens under floodlights. Air drops toward 22°C, so tyres cool fast on the straights.
Out-laps and prep laps become critical. A slow final sector can dump the tyres out of the working window.
F2 impact
F2 Practice takes place in the hottest part of the day. Expect low grip and bigger rear-tyre slide.
Drivers will fight traction out of Turns 10 and 16, especially on full fuel.
By F2 Qualifying, the sun is lower and the track more rubbered-in from F1 mileage.
Cooler air helps the engine, but tyre warm-up remains tricky. A single mistake on the push lap will be costly.
Saturday — November 29
F1 impact
The Sprint starts in late afternoon, with air near 25°C and strong sunlight on the back straight. Tyres will come up to temperature quickly, but surface temps can spike if drivers push too hard early. Late-race degradation may appear on the front-left, especially for cars running higher downforce.
By the time Qualifying begins at 21:00 local, the night air is cooler and more stable. Grip improves as rubber builds, yet rapid cooling on cool-down laps risks micro-graining if pressures are wrong.
F2 impact
The F2 Sprint runs at sunset. Track evolution is strong, but the surface is still quite abrasive on the fronts.
Teams will likely trim wing for straight-line speed, then rely on tyre management in the second half.
Sunday — November 30
F1 impact
The Grand Prix starts at 19:00 local with air around 22°C and falling. Track temperature will slide through the race, making early stints grippy and late stints more nervous.
Safety-car restarts could be dangerous. Tyres cool quickly on the long straights and heavy Turn 1 braking zone.
Teams will balance front-left protection against the need to push in clean air, especially on the middle stint.
F2 impact
The F2 Feature Race begins in late afternoon heat, roughly 25–26°C at lights-out.
This is likely the toughest tyre test of the weekend. Long green-flag runs will expose front-left wear.
Drivers who manage pace in the opening ten laps should gain big in the closing phase.
Tyres and Race Strategy for Qatar GP 2025
F1
Pirelli again brings its hardest trio to Lusail: C1, C2 and C3 as hard, medium and soft.
The FIA has kept the mandatory two-stop rule introduced here, with each slick set capped at 25 racing laps. That rule removes the classic tyre gamble of stretching a one-stop. Instead, the focus shifts to when you take your two stops and how early you dare to burn the quicker compounds.
Last time F1 raced here under similar rules, most teams favoured a hard-medium-hard or medium-hard-hard pattern. That will likely remain the baseline. The undercut is powerful because the long corners chew worn rubber and fresh tyres switch on quickly once the surface holds heat.
Pit lane time loss is significant, however, so teams will try to combine their two stops with any Safety Car or Virtual Safety Car. Expect aggressive “offset” strategies too: some cars will pit early to gain track position and then defend on older tyres in the final stint.
F1 tyre options, Photo Credit: Alpine F1 Team
F2
Pirelli has gone aggressive for Formula 2 in Qatar, bringing the Hard and Soft compounds. The Medium from 2024 is gone, swapped out for the Soft, which creates a much bigger performance gap between the two tyres.
The Hard is the only carry-over from last year. It is durable but very tricky to warm up, especially in the cooler evening sessions. Drivers will have to push hard on out-laps just to reach the working window, which in turn accelerates surface wear if they overdo it.
The Soft will be the tyre to have for Qualifying and the opening laps. It offers strong peak grip but cannot comfortably last the full Sprint distance, so managing degradation will be crucial once the initial performance drop kicks in. That Sprint runs at night, while the Feature Race takes place in warmer daytime conditions, so the same compounds will behave very differently across the two races.
Lusail itself is a high-speed, high-load circuit with a long main straight and multiple fast corners that lean heavily on the outer tyres. Last year, the most effective Feature strategy was a Hard-Medium approach, helped by several Safety Car periods that shortened the true racing mileage on each set.
With the 2025 switch to Hard–Soft, teams face a fresh puzzle: use the Soft for track position and accept a longer stint on the stubborn Hard, or flip the script and finish on the red-walled tyre, hoping late-race grip outweighs its fragile life.
What to watch
F1 Storylines to Follow at Lusail
Title Fight: Norris vs Verstappen vs Piastri
Lando Norris arrives at Qatar GP 2025 with his first real title match-point, holding a 24-point lead over both Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri after the Las Vegas upheaval and McLaren’s costly plank-wear disqualifications. If he extends that margin by even two points across the Sprint and Grand Prix or simply wins Sunday’s race – the championship is his.
But the real test is psychological. McLaren maintain that the Vegas infringement was the product of freak conditions rather than a risky setup, yet the DSQ erased an 18-point haul and reignited scrutiny over ride heights and kerb usage.
Standing opposite him is a resurgent Max Verstappen, whose late-season form has transformed the title narrative. Just three months ago he sat 104 points off the leader before Monza; now he enters Lusail only 24 behind after a run of podiums and victory in Las Vegas, a result made sweeter by McLaren’s exclusion. Qatar should play to his strengths. Red Bull’s improvements over varied ride-height windows suit Lusail’s fast, flowing layout, and Verstappen already has a Qatar win over Norris from last year’s duel.
Oscar Piastri remains very much in the hunt, even if momentum has slipped away from him. The Australian has matched Norris for raw pace throughout 2025, but crashes in Brazil and a subdued Vegas weekend have left him chasing instead of dictating the fight. If he can outscore Norris heavily in Qatar, the title fight becomes a three-way deadlock heading into Abu Dhabi.
Ferrari and Hamilton: Damage Limitation Weekend
Lewis Hamilton is staring at a stat line that does not fit his career: no Grand Prix podiums yet in his first Ferrari season. Brazil brought more frustration, and Las Vegas only added to the mood.
Ferrari were second here last year and ran the leaders close in both Qatar and Abu Dhabi, so they at least know how to make the car work in hot, high-speed conditions. The question is execution. Ferrari have often had pace in 2025, then bled results through strategy calls, reliability, or small driver errors. With the team now down to fourth in the constructors’ standings, Qatar is less about glory and more about stopping the slide.
Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton ahead of Qatar GP, Photo Credit: Scuderia Ferrari
F2: Title Fight, Teams’ Battle and Rookies
Fornaroli’s First Title Shot and the Teams’ Battle
Qatar gives Leonardo Fornaroli his first chance to close the deal. The Invicta driver arrives on 188 points, 19 clear of Jak Crawford, with Luke Browning, Richard Verschoor and Alexander Dunne still mathematically alive.
The maths is simple but brutal: Fornaroli needs a 40-point lead by Sunday night to be crowned champion before Abu Dhabi. That likely means outscoring Crawford by 21 points or more, while also keeping Browning and Verschoor in check. Anything less and the fight rolls on to Yas Marina. Lusail has history in this regard: last year it produced one of the wildest weekends of the season as Bortoleto, Hadjar and Aron traded blows for Feature Race victory. It is a track that loves title drama.
The Teams’ Championship is almost as tense as the drivers’ fight. Invicta Racing leads on 269 points, with Hitech Pulse-Eight / Hitech TGR just 12 points behind on 257. Campos lurks in third on 221.
Invicta has more wins in 2025, but Hitech is the form squad: four podiums in the last four races, including two victories. Browning, Beganovic and the Silverstone crew seem to have hit their stride at the perfect time. If Fornaroli stumbles and Hitech keeps logging big scores, both titles could be wide open again before Abu Dhabi.
Rookie Debuts: Tsolov and Wharton in the Lusail Deep End
Two fresh names join the grid. Nikola Tsolov steps up with Campos Racing, already aligned with the team for his full-time 2026 move, while James Wharton makes his debut at Trident, partnering Laurens van Hoepen.
Both arrive as recent F3 race winners. Tsolov finished runner-up in the 2025 F3 standings to Rafael Câmara, while Wharton also climbed the top step this year. Twelve months ago, F2’s Lusail rookies Dino Beganovic and John Bennett both scored points on debut. Beganovic even finished fifth in the Feature. The bar for this year’s newcomers is already set.
Feature Image: Red Bull Content Pool