Emilia Romagna Grand Prix talking points: Verstappen shows he isn’t going anywhere as Alpine’s egg continues to drip on their face

As Oscar Piastri’s bid to join Jack Brabham as the only Australian F1 driver to win four consecutive races ended, Max Verstappen pounced right back into the picture in an entertaining race in Italy.

Elsewhere we saw resurgent drives, pace drop off out of nowhere, and a certain team continue to shoot itself in the foot.

It’s all here to talk about and more in the latest edition of F1 talking points.

Verstappen proves that the 2025 title race is still wide open

You didn’t really think Max had gone away did you?

Whenever there is a sniff of something, the Dutchman is always there ready to pound, and on a weekend where the Red Bull looked to have genuine pace, he was always going to be the one to capitalise on it.

Added to this one of the best moves we have seen in recent memory into turn one, and Max Verstappen showed just why he is still well and truly in the fight for his fifth consecutive World Championship.

(Photo by Getty Images)

Less than a win separates the top three when it comes to points, which does seem a bit weird given the dominance of McLaren this season.

But with Verstappen remaining in the hunt and both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris being consistently strong, we are set for a three-way fight for the Championship in 2025 as the season starts to settle down.

Red Bull’s 400th celebration lap

Just like they did for their 100th race at the 2010 Hungarian Grand Prix, Red Bull celebrated their 400th race with a victory in a perfect way to celebrate the occasion.

It was a much better outcome than their last two century celebrations, with the team only managing 10th with Daniel Ricciardo for their 200th race in 2015 at the US Grand Prix, while Verstappen was only able to finish sixth in their 300th race at the 2020 Turkish Grand Prix.

Perhaps more significantly, their win in Italy took them to a total of 124 race victories, which surpasses Ferrari for the most victories in F1 for the 21st century.

It’s a ground-breaking achievement for the Austrian team, who weren’t taken overly seriously as a constructor when they entered the sport in 2005 after buying out the beleaguered Jaguar outfit.

How many more wins can the team achieve in their next 100 races? Watch this space.

New season, same old Alpine

As my last edition of F1 talking points went to press, Jack Doohan’s seat at Alpine was on a knife’s edge.

That knife swiftly went into Jack’s back, with the Aussie dumped after only six races in favour of Franco Colapinto.

It was a move that surprised nobody, with Doohan’s fate seemingly sealed the moment Colapinto was signed as a reserve driver by the team on the eve of the 2025 season.

But as we have so often seen with Alpine, it’s a decision that really doesn’t warrant much reasoning.

Doohan had not had the worst start to his F1 career as many had claimed he would. Yes, he had a couple of offs, but for the most part was on pace with his much more experienced teammate Pierre Gasly.

In fact, his start to the season was much better than several other drivers on the grid, with the likes of Liam Lawson, Garbiel Borteleto and even Fernando Alonso having far worse results.

But the inevitable switch happened, and in Imola we saw Colapinto basically do the same thing Doohan did in his first race of 2025: crash out in a session and be so so on pace for the remainder of the weekend.

The circus will seemingly continue at the team, with even their new old team principal Flavio Briatore contradicting previous statements made in the week leading into the Grand Prix at Imola around just how long Colapinto will be given a chance at the team. From five races to probably more, there is just always a level of confusion around anything done by the French team.

This column is far too short to be able to go over everything here, but one thing remains certain and that is that it never seems to end when it comes to the incredibly confusing decision making that Alpine does.

Old guard’s switcheroo

The two oldest drivers on the grid have had varying degrees of success in 2025, and their weekend in Imola seemed to sum up where they both are at.

Fernando Alonso, who remains scoreless in 2025, looked to have turned a corner when his Aston Martin showed good pace across the weekend and lined up well inside the top ten for the race.

Unfortunately for Alonso he wasn’t able to turn this into his first points of the season, with his race strategy, tyre performance and pace letting him down on Sunday to finish in 11th place.

Lewis Hamilton on the other hand had a disastrous Saturday for his first Italian race as a Ferrari driver, being eliminated in Q2.

However, it was the opposite of Alonso on Sunday, with everything that went against the Spaniard working for the Brit, as he stormed home to his best main race finish as a Ferrari driver in fourth place.

A massive boost for Hamilton no doubt, while Alonso continues to lament what could’ve been as he adds to his worst start to a season in a decade.

A fitting (potential) Imola finale

It’s sad that in my last couple of talking points I’ve had to complain about certain circuits getting extensions, when a circuit such as Imola is set to say goodbye to the sport.

I grew up loving the circuit as a kid, even after the tragic events that occurred there in 1994. I was devastated when it was dropped from the calendar after 2006, only to be thrilled that it made a return during the COVID seasons of F1.

And while it has managed to survive a few seasons since, sadly 2025 looks set to be the last time we will see the iconic circuit on the calendar for the time being.

At least the final race was a decent showing, and hopefully it will make a return to the sport at some point in the future.

This article was originally written for The Roar. You can read the published version here