Hamilton or Verstappen? How World Champion, Constructors' Titles Will Be Decided in Abu Dhabi

The Mercedes and Red Bull drivers are tied for the World Championship while their respective teams are battling for the team title.

Formula One has reached its final race and Abu Dhabi will determine who will be crowned the World Champion and which team will take home the Constructors' title. 

After a whirlwind of chaos and penalties in Saudi Arabia, Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton are tied for the world title at 369.5 points each, creating a 'winner takes all' scenario at Sunday's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. It will boil down to whoever wins or snags the most points. 

However, there is the possibility of finishing with the same number of points. In this scenario, 24-year-old Verstappen will win his first World Championship due to the tie-breaker advantage. He's won nine races this season to Hamilton's eight, the most recent being in Saudi Arabia. 

This is the first time in two title contenders have been level in points heading into the season finale since 1974.  

World Championship—Hamilton vs. Verstappen

Mercedes has taken every pole and win at Abu Dhabi from 2014-'19, and it was expected they would once again in 2020 until Verstappen shocked the Formula One world when he claimed his first pole position of the season. 

While he hopes to repeat on Sunday, Verstappen has yet to be the fastest qualifier since the United States Grand Prix in October. He most recently crashed in the wall during the final turn of qualifying for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. 

As Verstappen fights for his first world title, some drivers voiced in interviews with Formula One that they believe the 24-year-old will bring the trophy home this year. Aston Martin's Sebastian Vettel said Michael Schumacher is his hero, and "for that reason, I probably don’t want Lewis to win" while others focused on the season as a whole. 

“It will depend on the package a little bit; Mercedes lately have been more performing and they’ve won a couple of races now, but Max is driving – in my opinion – one step ahead of all of us," Alpine's Fernando Alonso said. "We saw the [qualifying] lap in Jeddah, until he touched the wall at the last corner, that lap was coming from Max, not the Red Bull.

“In a way, that’s my opinion: Mercedes deserve the constructors’ championship because the car is superior and Max, maybe overall in the year, was driving one step ahead of everyone.

“It’s not that I support Max, it’s that he deserves it, in my opinion.”

Hamilton is chasing a record-breaking eighth title after winning the last four. Since the track was first included in 2009, the 36-year-old has snagged five Abu Dhabi poles. 

Schumacher set the record after winning seven titles between 1994 and 2004, which Hamilton tied during the Turkish Grand Prix last season. 

“For me I’d love to see Lewis win," Williams's George Russell told F1. "I think what he has achieved, especially recently, is pretty exceptional, to even be in the fight altogether when Red Bull had such a far superior car at the start of the year; when you look back, [Mercedes] managed to win, I think, three of the first four races when Red Bull were clearly the quickest package out there.

“Max has done an exceptional job; you can argue that they both deserve to win for different reasons but hopefully it’s a clean and fair race and the best man wins.”

The tension has been high between Verstappen and Hamilton on the track, coming to a head while in Saudi Arabia. The race was tainted with three standing starts, a pair of restarts, multiple safety cars and a chaotic back-and-forth between the duo. At one point, Red Bull negotiated a penalty for Verstappen mid-race. 

It all came to a head when the 24-year-old was told to let Hamilton pass with 12 laps to go, but the two collided. 

LAP 38/50

MAX AND LEWIS COLLIDE!

Verstappen is instructed to give the place to Hamilton, but they make contact 😱#SaudiArabianGP 🇸🇦 #F1 pic.twitter.com/QnRaWoaYzP

— Formula 1 (@F1) December 5, 2021

Hamilton eventually passed Verstappen for the win. 

For Sunday's race, if neither driver scores a point, Verstappen would win the world title since he holds the tiebreaker advantage with nine race wins compared to Hamilton's eight wins. If neither driver scores any points, this would ve the first time in history that the top two drivers finished the year even on points. Hamilton needs to out-score Verstappen to win his eighth title. 

Constructors' Championship—Mercedes vs. Red Bull

Despite the tight battle for the drivers' title, Mercedes has the advantage with a 28-point lead in the standings. If they can score at least 17 points between Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas on Sunday, Mercedes will clinch its eighth consecutive title. 

Both Red Bull drivers, Verstappen and Sergio Perez, would need to place in the top four for any shot of its first constructors' championship since 2013. If, in some way, both Mercedes and Red Bull finish with the same amount of points, the latter will once again have the tiebreaker advantage due to their 10 Grand Prix victories.

Team Principal Christian Horner shared with Formula One that the group would "need a miracle" in Abu Dhabi.

“This team has put together a phenomenal campaign this year, we’ve won 10 races. We’ve taken Mercedes – and who would have thought that coming into this year – we’ve taken them all the way into the final race; constructors’, we’re on the back foot, we need a miracle to win that,” Horner said.

“We’ve got one more shot to have a go at winning this [drivers’] title with Max and we’ll give it everything we can, we’ll prepare, we’ll regroup. And the guys, they’re not down, they can be proud of the effort that’s gone in, and we’ll see.”