The confirmation matters because the schedule has already been redrawn once this year. F1 called off the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian rounds in March as regional tensions disrupted the early-season plans, and Bahrain's race was later rescheduled for October 4 at Sepang, running under the slightly surreal title of the Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia. Domenicali had floated a European fallback for the final rounds, with Imola touted, and set a mid-September deadline for a decision. That deadline now looks like a formality.

Abu Dhabi's organisers never blinked. Ethara chief executive Saif Rashid Al Noaimi says preparations are "progressing across every aspect of the event," and the promoter, fresh off being named F1's Promoter of the Year, has already confirmed Andrea Bocelli, Lewis Capaldi, Zara Larsson and Imagine Dragons for the after-race concerts. Ticket availability is now limited, per Ethara, so the run on Yas Marina seats has started early. Demand is, fittingly, racing (one pun per article, and that was it).

The sporting case for December in Abu Dhabi is stronger than it has been in years. Kimi Antonelli leads the championship by 59 points from his Mercedes teammate George Russell after 12 of 23 rounds, with Lewis Hamilton level on points with Russell in third. Lando Norris, the reigning champion, sits 83 points back. Mercedes leads the constructors' standings by 87 points from Ferrari. The gap at the top sounds comfortable until you watch how the last two races have gone.

Norris has won both of them, and Zandvoort showed how the balance has shifted. Max Verstappen crashed out of his final home grand prix on the opening lap, the race was red-flagged, and Antonelli beat Norris off the restart to lead most of the afternoon. Norris ran a seven-lap tyre offset, hunted the Mercedes down and swept around the outside at Tarzan on lap 54, winning by 11.5 seconds. "I knew I was going to commit to the braking, and that move won me the race," he said afterwards. Mercedes ordered Russell aside late on to recover second place for Antonelli, which tells you how seriously the team is taking the McLaren revival.

Monza this weekend adds the twist. Mercedes is changing Antonelli's engine, so the championship leader takes a grid penalty at his home grand prix. McLaren's upgrade package, introduced in Hungary, has made the car the quickest thing on Sundays, and Norris has just signed a contract extension through 2030. An 83-point deficit shrinks quickly at 25 points a race, and 11 rounds remain.

The shape of the season explains why nobody in the paddock is calling this settled. McLaren, the reigning constructors' champion, went winless through the opening 10 grands prix while Mercedes built its lead. The Hungary upgrade changed the picture inside a fortnight: Norris won in Budapest by a distance, took pole at Zandvoort with what he called the best lap of his life, then converted it into a second straight victory on merit. Toto Wolff said Mercedes is "very conscious" of a car that has now beaten the W17 at two consecutive races. Antonelli, meanwhile, has managed the pressure with a calm that belies a 20-year-old in his second season, and second place in the Netherlands was hardly a crisis. The trend line is the concern, not the result.

The run-in is unusually unpredictable even by modern standards. After Monza comes a brand-new circuit in Madrid, where no team has a lap of data, then Baku, the relocated Bahrain race at Sepang, a Singapore sprint weekend and a triple-header through Austin, Mexico City and Sao Paulo. Las Vegas follows, and then the sport arrives in the Gulf for the closing double: Lusail on November 29, Yas Marina a week later. Antonelli can absorb a bad weekend or two, but a bad month would put Norris right back in it.

Recent history says the trip south will be worth it. Last December, Yas Marina staged the first final-round title decider since 2021, three drivers arrived with a chance, and Norris left as champion. The 2026 version carries a different shape: a second-season leader defending a cushion, a champion in the fastest car chasing him down, and two Ferraris close enough to profit from any slip ahead of them.