So who was the worst F1 driver of 2009?

Working out who was the best F1 driver is never easy – a driver typically only has one rival who has the same equipment, and even within teams two cars are not necessarily always the same.

And it’s been even harder this year with the sudden emergence of Brawn and Red Bull as front runners, and the complication of drivers missing races and switching teams.

So thanks to everyone who offered their suggestions for how to rank the best drivers of 2009. I’ve looked at your lists, weighed up the stats and re-watched the races to produce my verdict on the top races of the year. Starting in reverse order here are the bottom ten drivers of 2009 with my thoughts on their performances and a selection of your comments.

No rank: Nelson Piquet Jnr

It would be wrong to rate Nelson Piquet Jnr as if he were just another driver.

He has damaged Formula 1 with calculated cynicism, agreeing to crash a car on purpose and then confessing to it a year later in an attempt to damage his former team.

Regardless of the self-serving nature of his actions, the FIA granted him immunity. He escaped the ban faced by co-conspirators Flavio Braitore and Pat Symonds – but any team manager would be mad to hire him after this.

Spin in Melbourne (blaming the brakes), three spins in China (destroying multiple nose cones), calling Buemi inexperienced after their crash in Monaco, crying to the press before being fired, crying some more after being fired, then almost causing an entire team to drop out of Formula 1 (maybe still time for that to happen) in one of the biggest scandals in a scandal-ridden sport, while pretending to be a victim in a crash he caused, in a situation he should’ve been man enough to just say no.

Four words: Reject of the Year.
Pedro Andrade

24. Luca Badoer

He was rushed in at Ferrari after it became clear Michael Schumacher would not be able to race.

At first Badoer’s struggles at Valencia were explained away by him being unfamiliar with the track. But at Spa it became clear the problem was driver-related.

Giancarlo Fisichella’s subsequent struggles with the F60 gave some insight into the difficulty Badoer faced. But not enough to excuse him being whole seconds off the pace of the next-slowest car.

Yes Luca, it was the media’s fault you were dropped. Specifically the medium of television, through which we could all see how bad you were.
Icthyes

23. Sebastien Bourdais

Sebastien Bourdais made his last F1 start at the Nürburgring

No noticeable improvement over last year, he usually failed to beat his rookie team mate. It’s fair to ask why Toro Rosso get through so many drivers but even so it wasn’t a surprise to see Bourdais get dropped.

His second year could have gone either way, sadly it went bad.
Bullfrog

22. Kazuki Nakajima

The only driver to start every race and not score a point. Given that his team mate racked up 34.5 and finished seventh in the championship, Nakajima’s dismal performance is hard to excuse.

Very close qualifying was Nakajima’s downfall. Rosberg got into Q3 14 times. Nakajima managed it four times. That margin left him with zero points.
Chalky

21. Romain Grosjean

Grosjean got a laot of criticism for his lacklustre showings for Renault, especially at Brazil where he seemed to go backwards.

A realistic appraisal has to take into account he was driving a dog of a car for a team that was reeling from the Singapore revelations, and up against one of the very best in the business.

In that context, lapping within a third of a second of Alonso at Yas Island is not something we should criticise him too harshly for, especially when he had little opportunity to test the car before his debut.

After some decent performances in GP2 I did expect a bit from Grosjean, but he was thrown into the deep end against Alonso no less. He properly deserves another decent shot at least, like Alguersuari.
Zenobia

20. Jaime Alguersuari

Became the youngest driver to start a Grand Prix despite lurid predictions he would crash into rivals, run over his mechanics and usher in the apocalypse.

In fact he beat Sebastien Buemi home in their first race together as team mates. It didn’t happen again, largely because of Alguerusari’s poor finishing rate (five retirements from eight starts) though that was largely down to the car.

Alguersuari qualified at the back and stayed there. I wish that Bourdais had been kept on.
sw6569

19. Kamui Kobayashi

Kamui Kobayashi impressed in Abu Dhabi

A difficult driver to place: Kobayashi only raced twice and gave two very different performances. In Brazil he qualified well behind Jarno Trulli and was criticised for some questionable defensive driving.

But his Abu Dhabi drive was a revelation. He kept Kimi Raikkonen at bay at the start to become the best of the ‘one stop’ runners, put a vital pass on Jenson Button after the new world champion had pitted, and jumped up to sixth ahead of team mate Jarno Trulli by the chequered flag.

Some may feel 19th is too low but given he only started twice putting him any higher would be a bit presumptuous. As many of you mentioned, hopefully the loss of backers Toyota from the grid next year won’t keep him from finding a drive for 2010.

Little time but already a solid performance from him.
Pedal to the Vettel

18. Adrian Sutil

Sutil should have been the driver to score Force India’s first points. But a crash in the rain Shanghai and an utterly unnecessary run-in with Kimi Raikkonen at the Nürburgring put paid to that.

Even after becoming de facto team leader following Fisichella’s Ferrari move, Sutil continued to squander good qualifying performances with avoidable clashes – with Nick Heidfeld at Singapore, and at Brazil where he paid the price of giving a rival no ‘racing room’.

Showed plenty of promise but still several mistakes and crashes.
David A

17. Vitantonio Liuzzi

Vitantonio Liuzzi was on course for a strong finish at Monza before retiring

Parachuted in at Force India for the last few rounds, he ran well at Monza before his car failed. He finished more times than Sutil in their five races together, was right behind his team mate at Suzuka and beat him at Yas Island.

There are many people who think Toro Rosso gave up on Liuzzi too soon, and his brief appearance in F1 this year suggests he deserves a spot on the grid in 2010.

Liuzzi gets my understated performance of the year award. His first race at Monza back in an F1 car was fantastic, he definitely would have picked up points and possibly a podium if his engine hadn’t blown up.
sw6569

16. Sebastien Buemi

All told, a decent maiden season for the young Swiss driver. Especially given how the STR4 struggled to emulate the success of its predecessor, and was noted for its unreliability.

He got off to a strong start by scoring on his debut and adding an eighth in the rain at China. A long point-less spell followed but towards the end of the year the car came good and suddenly Buemi’s name was getting noticed in practice sessions.

At Suzuka he impressed by reaching the top ten – despite several very wayward moments and a crash late in the session. But he was back in the points in the final two races and qualified a fine sixth at Interlagos.

Good first season in F1.
SaloolaS

Join us for part two covering positions 15 to six tomorrow. The top five will be published on Friday – along with your chance to vote for the driver of the year.

Here’s a video from a Williams activity day for their sponsors which was held last month at Silverstone.

Among the machinery on display was Keke Rosberg’s 1982 championship-winning Williams-Cosworth FW08B. Appropriately, Williams will be using Cosworth power once again next year, though Keke’s son Nico will not be driving for the team any more.

Nico Rosberg was on hand to drive the cars and answer the sponsor’s questions, as former fellow outgoing driver Kazuki Nakajima and one of their replacements, Nico Hülkenberg.

The team also had a 1996 Williams-Renault FW18 which Damon Hill used to win the world championship, and a 2007 Williams-Toyota FW27, albeit in the team’s 2009 colours (they cannot run their current cars due to testing restrictions).

Williams video

• BMW’s first F1 test with Williams (video)
• Video: Williams Grand Prix cars
• Williams to demonstrate three F1 cars at Goodwood Festival of Speed (Video)
• Williams fans at 500th GP show (Video)
• Meet the Williams test team (Video)

Top 50 fastest laps

Vettel took an emphatic win in the final race of 2009

Sebastian Vettel took advantage of problems for Lewis Hamilton to win his fourth Grand Prix of 2009.

It was a one-two for Red Bull as Mark Webber kept Jenson Button at bay to take second place in an exciting end to an otherwise predictable race.

With KERS and a clear run to the first corner Lewis Hamilton was never in much danger of losing the lead. But even on the first lap there were tell-tales signs of the problem that was going to end his race – he braked too deep into the turn six chicane, allowing Vettel to briefly close up, but KERS kept him safe on the straight.

Webber took up third despite making contact with Rubens Barrichello at the first turn. The impact knocked part of the Brawn’s wing off, and while he got used to the car’s impaired handling Button seized the opportunity to squeeze past and take fourth.

Given his pace in practice and qualifying Hamilton was expected to tear off into the distance. But it didn’t happen – he edged a few tenths away from Vettel here and there, but on lap 11 he out-braked himself again and lost almost all of his small lead.

It was clear he was not going to hold onto the lead after the first round of pit stops but he hardly made it any further than that. His braking problems were traced to the right-rear of the car and Hamilton was told to park up – the first time an F1 car had let him down in 52 races.

Vettel’s pit stop passed without drama – but only just. Toro Rosso driver Jaime Alguersuari had been pit-bound with a gearbox problem and accidentally swung into Vettel’s pit box. The Red Bull mechanics hurried him out as Vettel arrived. Alguersuari, meanwhile, failed to complete the next lap and retired.

Webber had pitted before Vettel, so after their pit stops Vettel had a helathy lead of more than six seconds.

After the early pit stops Kamui Kobayashi rose to third place and the highest placed single-stopper. That was partly thanks to smart driving on the first lap keeping Kimi Raikkonen boxed in, preventing the Ferrari driver from being able to exploit his KERS boost.

Button came out in front of Kobayashi after the Brawn had been serviced, and the pair resumed their battle from Interagos. But this time it was the lighter-fuelled Kobayashi who seized the advantage, passing Button down the inside at turn eight.

That delay cost Button in the dying stages of the race. Once the second round of pit stops had been dispensed with he found himself quickly catching Webber, who was struggling in the braking zones. Button only had the last lap to launch an attack and Webber repelled his advances in brilliant fashion.

Their duel meant Vettel enjoyed an untroubled run to victory, which he took by over 17 seconds. Barrichello finished fourth behind his team mate and one place ahead of Nick Heidfeld in the final race for BMW. Heidfeld had worried about his team mate’s pace during practice but Robert Kubica slipped down the order after spinning while trying to pass Sebastien Buemi.

Kobayashi finished a remarkable sixth which could serve as a boost to the chances of Toyota approving a budget for the team later this month. Jarno Trulli backed him up in seventh, and Buemi scored the final point.

Kubica finished tenth behind Nico Rosberg, with Heikki Kovalainen behind him in 11th having started 18th. Raikkonen’s inability to make progress early on meant he finished hislast race for Ferrari in 12th.

His replacement, Fernando Alonso, ended his last race for Renault in 14th behind Kazuki Nakajima.

Vitantonio Liuzzi beat team mate Adrian Sutil in his final race, the Italian finishing 15th ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella. Romain Grosjean was the last classified runner in 18th.

F1 now heads into the off-season with many unanswered questions about next year’s line-up. The likes of Kobayashi and Liuzzi made cases for why their teams should retain them for 2010, but Grosjean is surely among those worrying he might not get another crack next year.

Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

• Abu Dhabi Grand Prix result
• Final 2009 F1 championship standings
• Rate the race: Abu Dhabi

Constructors’ championship

Evening turned to night during Abu Dhabi qualifying

With a spanking new multi-million pound venue and a golden sunset, F1′s photographers have outstripped themselves capturing some truly gorgeous pictures from today’s qualifying session. Here’s the pick of the bunch.

Read more: F1 cars in action at Abu Dhabi (pictures)

Images (C) Ferrari spa, Brawn GP, Renault/LAT, Williams/LAT, Bridgestone, www.mclaren.com, Getty Images/Red Bull, Force India F1 Team, Toyota F1 World, BMW ag

Hamilton kept the two Red Bull drivers behind to take pole position

Lewis Hamilton dominated qualifying for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix to take pole position by two-thirds of a second.

The two Red Bulls will line up behind him but team mate Heikki Kovalainen was left 13th after his McLaren broke down during Q2.

Q1

Hamilton began qualifying with an impressive show of strength, reeling off a series of quick laps on the medium tyre. He finished off with a 1’39.873, which at that point was 1.4s faster than anyone else, and spent the rest of the session in the pits.

Button got closest to Hamilton’s time, setting a 1’40.378 later in Q1. Kovalainen, however, only escaped the drop zone with his final lap, almost a whole second down on Hamilton.

Kazuki Nakajima also made a late escape from the bottom five and those two 11th-hour improvements left Fernando Alonso dropping to a disastrous 16th – ending his final qualifying session for Renault.

The Force Indias, having shown some promise in practice, were also knocked out in the first part of the session.

Drivers eliminated in Q1

16. Fernando Alonso, Renault – 1’41.667
17. Vitantonio Liuzzi, Force India-Mercedes – 1’41.701
18. Adrian Sutil, Force India-Mercedes – 1’41.863
19. Romain Grosjean, Renault – 1’41.950
20. Giancarlo Fisichella, Ferrari – 1’42.184

Q2

A few drivers, including the McLaren duo, tried to get through Q2 using just the soft tyre to set a time, but generally found the medium tyres better. Kovalainen, however, was in real trouble – his McLaren came to a halt shortly after he’d set a 1’40.983.

Once again, Hamilton was the man to beat, setting a 1’39.695 to snatch the top spot from Vettel by three-tenths. There was nothing his team mate could do about being eliminated however.

The other Finish driver was also in trouble. Kimi Raikkonen was left in 11th as Nico Rosberg burst free of the drop zone with his final lap.

Sebastien Buemi made it into the final ten comfortably, but team mate Jaime Alguersuari was over half a second slower than anyone else, ending up 15th.

Drivers eliminated in Q2

11. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari – 1’40.726
12. Kamui Kobayashi, Toyota – 1’40.777
13. Heikki Kovalainen, McLaren-Mercedes – 1’40.983
14. Kazuki Nakajima, Williams-Toyota – 1’41.148
15. Jaime Alguersuari, Toro Rosso-Ferrari – 1’41.689

Q3

A host of different drivers took provisional pole position during Q3 – but with Hamilton biding his time it seemed inevitable they would be disappointed.

And so it proved, as the McLaren driver timed his final lap to perfection and set a 1’40.948 to demote Vettel to second.

Webber lined up behind his team mate. The two Brawns followed with Button, who complained of tyre vibrations, beaten by Barrichello once again.

The only Toyota driver to reach Q3 was Trulli, who managed sixth, while the BMWs start their final Grand Prix from the fourth row.

The fuel weights will be published in a few hours’ time, but they’re not likely to offer Hamilton’s rivals any realistic hope they can keep him from victory. Tomorrow’s race already looks like being a fight for second place.

Top ten drivers in Q3

1. Lewis Hamilton, McLaren-Mercedes – 1’40.948
2. Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull-Renault – 1’41.615
3. Mark Webber, Red Bull-Renault – 1’41.726
4. Rubens Barrichello, Brawn-Mercedes – 1’41.786
5. Jenson Button, Brawn-Mercedes – 1’41.892
6. Jarno Trulli, Toyota – 1’41.897
7. Robert Kubica, BMW – 1’41.992
8. Nick Heidfeld, BMW – 1’42.343
9. Nico Rosberg, Williams-Toyota – 1’42.583
10. Sebastien Buemi, Toro Rosso-Ferrari – 1’42.713

*Five-place penalty for a gearbx change

Kimi Raikkonen is on Toyota's wish-list

Remarkably, with just one race left to run the entry list for next year is far from complete. Just six drivers have their contracts officially in place for 2010 and there could be as many as 22 places left to fill.

Among those yet to sign deals are newly-crowned champion Jenson Button, team mate Rubens Barrichello and former champion Kimi Raikkonen. So where are they going to end up?

Toyota court Raikkonen

Raikkonen has had discussions with McLaren and Toyota. His salary demands appear to be too much for the latter, and he is also negotiating for the smallest commitment to PR events he can get away with.

Toyota have given off mixed signals about who could be driving for them next year. While John Howett has been critical of Jarno Trulli in the press, the Italian claims team boss Tadashi Yamashina wants him to stay.

Similarly, Timo Glock has insisted he will keep his place and poured scorn on claims he was informed of the team’s decision to drop him at Singapore. Howett described Glock’s stand-in, Kamui Kobayashi, as “a bit slow” in Brazil but also suggested the Japanese driver could stay at the team in 2010.

But we still can’t take their participation next year for granted until their budget is confirmed next month. New Toyota president Akio Toyoda blogs about his company’s road cars using a pseudonym and isn’t very complimentary about them. One has to wonder what he makes of his company’s faltering F1 effort.

Lots of room for rookies

Four different names have been linked to the second Renault seat alongside Robert Kubica. They include former Renault test drivers Lucas di Grassi and Franck Montagny, plus Glock and Bruno Senna.

This suggests Romain Grosjean has fallen out of favour already. His results haven’t been great but given how he was hastily drafted into the team with little testing, perhaps he’s being judged too harshly too quickly.

Many of the latest crop of GP2 talent have got sponsors lined up and are hoping for places at F1′s new teams for 2010 – Manor, USF1, Campos and Lotus.

Looking elsewhere it would be astonishing if, having won the championship with Brawn, Button ended up somewhere else next year. He’s found himself at the centre of contract disputes in the past, but a wrangle over money at this late stage would reflect poorly on the new champion.

It still looks as though Barrichello will make way for Nico Rosberg at Brawn, heading to Williams in a straight swap. As Williams will not be using Toyota engines next year, Kazuki Nakajima will most likely be moving on.

Two drivers rarely mentioned in the ‘who goes where’ discussions are Heikki Kovalainen and Nick Heidfeld. Kovalainen will stay at McLaren if Raikkonen doesn’t tke his place, but Heidfeld is taking a risk if he gambles on Qadbak keeping the former BMW team in Formula 1.

Slow upheaval

One thing is for sure – almost every team in F1 will start 2010 with a different pair of drivers to who they ended 2009 with. Red Bull is the only certain exception at this stage.

The scale of the upheaval is one of the reasons why the driver market is moving so slowly this year.

Last year the driver market was unusually stable – most teams kept the same pairings for 2009 as 2008. And many of those drivers had contracts that expired in 2009. So everyone’s on the move at once.

The recession has forced teams to cut budgets and that means some tough discussions on driver salaries are taking place – Button and Raikkonen are cases in point.

Add to that the uncertainty over which teams will be competing next year and the situation becomes very complex.

As usual, the most coveted drivers take their seats first and that is by and large what has happened so far. But it’s taking a while and there could be some surprises still to come.

Read more: 2010 F1 drivers and teams