Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur fears the closeness at the front of the field could turn the F1 2025 season into a “quali championship”.

The Japanese Grand Prix proved to be a race of few on-track overtakes, with cars unable to catch and pass each other on Sunday – with Vasseur believing the current cars are “very, very sensitive to the clean air and dirty air.”

Fred Vasseur predicts possible F1 ‘quali championship’ after lack of Japan overtaking

The weekend saw a Formula 1 first at a permanent circuit, in that the top six on the grid finished in the same order in which they started, with the top 10 on the grid all finishing in the points, albeit with minor changes to the lower order.

This led to something of a processional feel to the Japanese Grand Prix, as Max Verstappen held off the chase of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri for victory.

Given the small performance difference between multiple cars in the field this season, Vasseur explained his prediction that a “quali championship” may take place, given the importance of one-lap pace.

“For sure, qualifying is always crucial in the performance,” Vasseur told reporters after the Japanese Grand Prix.

“The smaller the gap is between cars, the more true that is, because you are in the group of cars.

“It’s not that you are just one fighting with the guy in front of you. Yes, it will probably be a quali championship.”

How the drivers match up in F1 2025 qualifying and race trim so far

👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying records between team-mates

👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates

Expanding further on the subject of why Ferrari were able to control the pace in the Sprint in China in particular, Vasseur explained that the subject of ‘dirty air’, whereby cars lose performance when following another closely, appears to be a talking point once again.

With gaps between cars and tyre management to take into account, the Ferrari team boss said there are set to be variations from weekend to weekend.

“If you asked Norris what’s happened on Saturday, I think he will struggle to explain, or to Piastri, when he was behind Verstappen on Saturday, and I think it’s the car is very, very sensitive to the clean air and dirty air.

“As soon as you are behind someone, even when it’s three or four seconds, we start to struggle a little bit to damage more the tyres, to reduce consistency, and I think China was a very good example.

“But I think on Verstappen, also on Piastri or Norris, I think from one session to the other, depending on the gap with the car in front of you, that you have a different result and it’s, again, quite tricky, even from stint to stint today, if you look at Antonelli for example, that he was struggling a little bit on the first stint.”

From a driving perspective, Fernando Alonso took a broader view after the race, making a comparison to the Monaco Grand Prix in weighing the driving challenge around the circuit against the racing spectacle it can provide.

When asked about the quality of racing on Sunday, Alonso told reporters after the race: “This is Suzuka – I don’t remember a race many times in the past where there is lots of overtaking without the weather changing.

“It seems every year we repeat always on Thursday how great Suzuka is, how great Monaco is, the glamour, the spectacular weekend, and then on Sunday we wake up and say: ‘Ah, Monaco is boring, what can we do to the track? Suzuka is boring.’

“Instead of looking at the negative, I try to enjoy the experience, and it was another great Suzuka.”

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