[Keith Campbell]

My views on drivers change over time. During 2010-2013 I was convinced Alonso and Vettel were the class of the field, as they seemed to be the two that consistently performed at a very high level. There were two seasons that were a bit more questionable for Vettel, 2010 and 2012 where I think Hamilton was probably better too, but overall I had Vettel and Alonso as the top two. Since 2014 Vettel’s stock has fallen quite a bit though, I don’t know if it’s the change to the cars or maybe I was overrating him before but he’s been very inconsistent, and outperformed by Ricciardo in 2014 and Leclerc so far this year. He had one good year in 2015 but recently he’s been a shadow of his former self.

Ricciardo I rate highly but he was getting outperformed by Verstappen so I can’t hold him at the very top any more either. And as others have said, it’s too early in his career to know just how good Leclerc is, he may turn out to be a great but I wouldn’t put him up there yet.

So that leaves Verstappen and Hamilton as my current top two. Verstappen for me has been slightly ahead this year purely because he has had more of a fight on his hands against faster or equal cars, and more opportunity to show his talent (couple of errors in the last two races though). Overall, I’d rate Hamilton slightly higher in general because while I doubt there is much to choose between them on pace, Hamilton has more experience and knows when to back out of something and bank the points. Verstappen still has to hone his attitude a bit in my opinion, although he’s been very strong since Monaco last year.

[Keith Campbell]

Although I’ve followed F1 to varying degrees since the mid 90s I have only watched it religiously since 2010, so I will only vote from then. I also really want to pick two for some years but you can take the first name as my actual ‘vote’.

My embarrassingly short list is:

2010: Hamilton/Alonso
2011: Vettel
2012: Alonso
2013: Vettel
2014: Alonso/Ricciardo
2015: Vettel
2016: Ricciardo (so far)

Interesting that Vettel seems to do well in the odd years (in most people’s votes so far)… coincidence? Probably.

[Keith Campbell]

@xtwl

Sorry to go a bit geeky and off-racing-topic but electric cars aren’t as bad as you make them out to be. Of course the technology still needs improvement, but improvements can happen exponentially in a short space of time. Solar PV panels at one time were very expensive to produce, both in money and carbon cost but costs have come down around 75% in the last 5 years alone so they can now make a reasonable return. There may be similar associated manufacturing costs with electric cars currently but those will also drop significantly over time.

Other engineering issues like charging times will be overcome with time too. There are already charging stations capable of charging a car in under an hour and i’ve also heard discussions on a system where batteries would be swapped out at a ‘refuel’ station rather than charged on the spot (the car owner essentially wouldn’t ‘own’ the battery, just pay for a charged one much like paying for fuel).

Hydrogen fuel cells are also promising and may be the ‘end-game’ solution but are much further from commercial realisation in my view. I don’t think there is any reason both electric and hydrogen vehicles can’t play a part in the future of transport (supported by low carbon electricty sources such as renewables).

[Keith Campbell]

South Korea definately!

Actually my top 10 picks would be:

Australia
Bahrain
Canada
Britain
Belgium
Italy
Japan
Mexico
Brazil
Abu Dhabi

But this would leave some quite big gaps in between live races. Also if the selection process is as Keith described they likely won’t get the best 10, they will get the best 3 then it becomes a bit of a lottery. So the three guaranteed ones i would take are Abu Dhabi (sadly, but only because it could be the title decider), Britain (home race i feel has to be chosen) and third one would be tricky… maybe Mexico because it’s the only new one and they can make a feature of it.

[Keith Campbell]

I actually already had a go at this – more of a trial and error than mathematical solution but this is one possible solution. I had one significant difference in my understanding of the votes though – i was under the impression team principles couldn’t vote for their own drivers… is this wrong? I can’t remember if i read that from a previous year or made it up – either way my solution assumes each driver receives a maximum of 9 votes only, leading to this:

+----------+--------+-----------+--------+---------+
|    1     |   2    |     3     |   4    |    5    |
+----------+--------+-----------+--------+---------+
| Hamilton | Alonso | Ricciardo | Bottas | Rosberg |
| 25       | 25     | 25        | 18     | 18      |
| 25       | 25     | 25        | 18     | 18      |
| 25       | 18     | 18        | 15     | 18      |
| 25       | 18     | 15        | 12     | 15      |
| 25       | 15     | 12        | 12     | 10      |
| 18       | 15     | 10        | 12     | 10      |
| 18       | 15     | 10        | 12     | 10      |
| 18       | 12     | 10        | 10     | 8       |
| 15       | 12     | 10        | 10     | 8       |
|          |        |           |        |         |
| 194      | 155    | 135       | 119    | 115     |
+----------+--------+-----------+--------+---------+

+-------+--------+---------+--------+-------+
|   6   |   7    |    8    |   9    |  10   |
+-------+--------+---------+--------+-------+
| Massa | Vettel | Bianchi | Button | Kvyat |
| 15    | 15     | 8       | 15     | 8     |
| 8     | 12     | 8       | 12     | 6     |
| 8     | 6      | 6       | 8      | 6     |
| 8     | 6      | 4       | 2      | 2     |
| 6     | 4      | 4       | 2      | 2     |
| 6     | 4      | 4       | 1      | 2     |
| 4     | 4      | 4       |        | 1     |
|       | 2      | 4       |        | 1     |
|       |        | 2       |        |       |
|       |        |         |        |       |
| 55    | 53     | 44      | 40     | 28    |
+-------+--------+---------+--------+-------+

Obviously i used points rather than placings but you can see what it means fairly clearly. This is just one possible solution that fitted neatly, going for what i took to be likely results for the first 3 drivers and then just piecing together the rest (using the ‘easiest’ to find solution rather than the most likely one).

Many thanks to @BenH for the sensefulsolutions link for the tables.

[Keith Campbell]

Just bumping my own thread for any who are interested to read it – I have updated my average speeds analysis to cover the final three races of 2014 – see below (apologies that the table doesn’t format well on F1F)

Length (km) 2014 pole (secs) Speed (km/hr) 2nd best team (qualy) Qualy winner of Merc
1 Monza 5.793 84.109 248 Williams Ham
2 Spa 7.004 110.511 228 RedBull wet Ros
3 Austria 4.326 68.759 226 Williams (Merc) Ros
4 Japan 5.807 92.506 226 Williams Ros
5 Brazil 4.309 70.023 222 Williams Ros
6 Britain 5.891 95.766 221 Redbull wet Ros
7 Germany 4.574 76.540 215 Williams Unknown
8 Russia 5.848 98.513 214 Williams Ham
9 Canada 4.361 74.874 210 RedBull (even) Ros
10 Bahrain 5.412 93.185 209 RedBull Ros
11 USA 5.513 96.067 207 Williams Ros
12 Abu Dhabi 5.554 100.480 199 Williams Ros
13 Spain 4.655 85.232 197 RedBull Ham
14 Hungary 4.381 82.715 191 RedBull damp Unknown
15 Australia 5.303 104.231 183 RedBull wet Ham
16 Singapore 5.065 105.681 173 RedBull Ham
17 China 5.451 113.860 172 Redbull wet Ham
18 Malaysia 5.543 119.431 167 Redbull wet Ham
19 Monaco 3.340 75.989 158 RedBull Ros

Building on my comments from last time.

1) Williams improved relative to RedBull in the second half of the season and outqualified the Bulls at two circuits which perhaps previously were in the RedBull ‘window’; USA and Abu Dhabi. This leaves the score at 8-4 to Williams on the 12 fastest tracks (2 of those 4 being wet sessions), and 7-0 to RedBull on the slowest 7 tracks (4 of those being wet/damp).
2) Rosberg continued his impressive qualifying form in the final three races by securing pole on one fast circuit (Brazil), and two ‘medium speed’ circuits (USA and Abu Dhabi) which could have been in either driver’s preferred range. The final score between the Mercedes duo is therefore 9-2 to Rosberg on the 12 fastest circuits (with Germany being unknown and therefore not counted) and 5-1 to Hamilton on the 7 slowest circuits (Hungary being another unknown).
3) The final three circuits were all faster than I had anticipated for various reasons but primarily because softer tyre allocations were used than in 2013. It’s difficult to draw direct comparisons, but given that the rule of thumb is that the 2014 tyres of the same specification are one stage harder than the 2013 equivalents, the pole times for these races should give an indication of the 2014 cars’ qualifying performance relative to last year. Brazil was resurfaced so not really useful (and maybe wet last year anyway?) but the times for USA and Abu Dhabi were -0.28% and +0.52% relative to 2013. That’s not too bad considering it’s the first year of the regulations and the scaremongering that was going on about how slow the cars would be before the season started. I accept that the average race speeds are still a fair bit slower because of the fuel restriction and that the cars can’t sustain qualifying engine (ERS) modes for the whole race.

[Keith Campbell]

@atticus-2 Most likely we are equally deluded then ;) Comparing drivers in different cars is pretty subjective though so there’s no right or wrong answers, but that’s part of what makes it so interesting.

A bit offtopic, but I just realised we’ve all been harsh on Maldonado this year:

… his car was actually being driven by David Guetta! And the Lotus was designed and operated by a group of girls in catsuits… actually that explains their performance a bit. (disclaimer – i’m not suggesting women can’t be good engineers/mechanics, just perhaps not those ones ;) )

p.s might need to adjust Grosjean’s ranking for losing to David Guetta too.

[Keith Campbell]

1) Alonso – Utterly destroyed his world champion teammate in both qualifying and races. I’ve heard all the arguments about the car being designed for him and not suiting Raikkonen’s driving style etc etc, but that takes nothing away from his performance in my view. I can’t see any significant flaws in his season – ok, he had one hiccup in hitting the back of Vettel at Spa I think it was – but other than that he was on it in virtually every qualifying and race session. For me, it’s not just about scoring the maximum result, it’s about how difficult it was to achieve that result, and Alonso had to fight with similar or faster paced cars in every race to finish where he did. I don’t think anyone on the grid could have scored more points than Alonso in this year’s Ferrari so that’s why I’ve ranked him No.1.
2) Ricciardo – Exceptional all round performance and he was the surprise of the season for me and many others. Few expected him to step into Vettel’s ‘home’ and match him, let alone comprehensively outperform him in almost every race. His wheel to wheel skills were as impressive as anybody on the grid, and he really had to battle his way up the field due to the RedBull’s shoddy straight line speed. My only criticism is that his starts were often reminiscent of his Aussie predecessor and in some ways this was the tiebreaker between ranking him at 1 or 2 this year.
3) Hamilton – Deserving world champion and barely put a foot wrong in the races all year. It was his race pace that would have been the deciding factor in the championship (if not for reliability issues ultimately making it moot) and he showed some great racecraft both against his teammate and coming from the back of the grid when he needed to. The only negative is in getting outqualified by his teammate, which shows there was even more performance available – thankfully for the sake of a contest he wasn’t dominant in both qualifying and races or it may have been a very 2011/2013 kind of season.
4) Button – Probably higher than most will rank him but when I look back at the season I can’t see what more he could have done. In his weaker discipline of qualifying he beat his teammate, and in races he was usually in a different class. He very nearly pipped Massa in the world championship in a vastly superior Williams, and came close to a podium in the wet in Suzuka before being overhauled by the superior RedBulls. If McLaren do let him go for next year I don’t think it has anything to do with his performance this year and there’s probably nothing he could have done to change the outcome.
5) Rosberg – Many seem surprised by how hard he has pushed Hamilton this year – I don’t count myself amongst them because they were closely matched last year with Rosberg having a particularly strong end to 2013. He had the beating of Lewis in qualifying over the season but couldn’t match him for racepace, which lead to several small mistakes and an infamous rash move at Spa. Whatever the reason for his lack of race pace, be it fuel saving, tyre conservation, consistency or other, he will need to find something extra to be in with a chance against Lewis next year.
6) Bottas – A very consistent performer over the year and when the Williams was competitive he was usually able to deliver the result it deserved. Keeps his racing clean and outscored his very experienced teammate. However, when you look at the head to head statistics it was actually very close between himself and Massa so I think the points score is slightly flattered by Massa’s many incidents and misfortunes. Bottas needs to work on his starts but other than that he looks the complete package with good qualifying speed, race pace and racecraft.
7) Vettel – 2014 must have been a shock to the system for Sebastian. Coming from a car that was class of the field from 2010-2013 not only did he have to deal with a non-dominant car but also with a teammate who turned out to be relentlessly competitive. There’s no doubt Seb struggled to adapt to the 2014 turbo cars but he was not helped by a lack of running in pre-season testing, reliability problems early in the season and subsequent grid penalties later on. Although he was outclassed by his teammate he seemed to improve in the second half of the season and put in some strong performances.
8) Hulkenberg – A very strong start to the season, maximising the points available when the Force India was at its most competitive. He seemed to drop off after the summer break while the team pursued “the wrong development path” but came back in the last few races to regain the upper hand on his teammate.
9) Vergne – Similar to Button, I struggle to see what more JEV could have done to retain his seat. He does lack something in qualifying, losing the head to head in that department to his rookie teammate, but his advantage in racecraft and race pace lead to a convincing points lead by the end of the season. Continues to be a driver to watch in wet/mixed conditions, able to run alongside the leaders during parts of the Hungarian GP for instance. Maybe he’s not the F1 superstar that RedBull is looking for but he’s certainly done more than many, better backed drivers who have retained seats for 2015 so I will be a little sad to see him go. Interested to see how he gets on in another category though so good luck to him wherever he ends up.
10) Massa – As shown in the first half of the season with several race incidents, he does still have a tendency to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Often it wasn’t his fault but I still feel it’s more than a coincidence and something that some other drivers leave enough of a margin to avoid. However, when he had clean races he generally competed well, often matching or beating his highly rated young teammate.

11) Perez
12) Grosjean
13) Kvyat
14) Raikkonen
15) Magnussen
16) Kobayashi
17) Sutil
18) Gutierrez
19) Maldonado
20) Chilton
21) Ericsson

I won’t write an analysis of drivers outside the top 10, partly because I suspect anyone still reading is bored by now and also because for the lower places (16+) I perhaps didn’t pay enough attention to their performances to rate them accurately. I also have not rated Jules Bianchi as I feel that given his situation it doesn’t feel right to debate his performance this year – so suffice to say I am wishing the best for him and his family #forzajules

[Keith Campbell]

I did not see that twist coming. I was certain you were talking about Sutil. ;)

[Keith Campbell]

@fastiesty @atticus-2 Thanks for your replies. Iestyn – yes you could run the comparison against any of the teams or team-mates, the next thing i would likely look at would be Ferrari vs Williams vs McLaren etc. There probably wouldn’t be much value comparing Alonso and Raikkonen this year since it’s been so one sided you wouldn’t be able to find a pattern on a win/loss comparison – although you could do a time delta comparison on qualifying times and see if you find a trend.

Atticus – Yes point 1 was so obvious it didn’t really require analysis, but i’ve never actually looked closely at average speeds before so i wasn’t sure where the circuits ranked in relation to each other. For example, I would have thought Abu Dhabi was a bit faster than it turned out to be, but my opinion was based on gut feeling rather than data so it’s nice to have something more scientific to refer to.

[Keith Campbell]

Scotland 1-2, I like it! Where’s Paul di Resta? ;)

It’s always interesting to see how different systems rate the drivers and I think this one might help highlight some drivers who are usually very under-rated, like de Angelis as the author mentions in his conclusions. But as with all systems there are flaws, and I think one flaw here is not taking into account variance in driver form due to age or any other factors – as shown by the exceptionally high rating of Nico Rosberg primarily caused by him beating Schumacher (most people probably rate Nico around 4-7th best driver this year, let alone of all time!). The other flaw is some drivers seem to be penalised for having strong team-mates, such as with Senna and Prost.

It is also based on highest 3 year peak, and you could argue a larger sample would be a better measure of ‘greatness’, but that’s just one of many subjective choices in designing a system which means that no mathematical formula can ever be perfect. Was still an interesting read, as much for the background info on the drivers as the ratings themselves.

[Keith Campbell]

1) Alonso
2) Ricciardo
3) Hamilton
4) Rosberg
5) Bottas
6) Hulkenberg
7) Vettel
8) Button
9) Vergne
10) Grosjean

[Keith Campbell]

1) Alonso – has to fight for every position and hasn’t put a wheel wrong yet. Contrast to Raikkonen just makes the car look worse and him look even better.
2) Ricciardo – has surprised almost everyone with his performances this season. The qualifying pace isn’t that surprising, but also race pace and wheel to wheel he has been exceptional.
3) Hamilton – not a perfect season by any means. Plenty of mistakes but with the WDC at stake and the lion’s share of bad luck has still marginally outperformed his teammate. Needs to cut out the mistakes to take the title.
4) Rosberg – has challenged his teammate for pace throughout the season as he did last year, but still a tad reliant on mistakes or misfortune other side of the garage. If he keeps up the performances of the last 5 races then Lewis will have to be at his best to take the title.
5) Hulkenberg – not so many headline grabbing performances but consistently getting as much from the car as possible.
6) Bottas – impressive consistency and maturity and is now getting the results the car deserves. Very few errors and keeps his head in the right place. Needs to keep outpacing Massa consistently to be considered a future WDC contender.
7) Vettel – a lot of bad luck has gone his way but even without it, his teammate has outperformed him in all categories. Not a terrible performance but not the level we have come to expect. His reputation could take a bit of a hammering if he can’t challenge his teammate in second half of the season.
8) Button – pretty consistent if not outstanding, i think he’s doing as much as he can with the car and has outpaced his rookie teammate most weekends.
9) Perez – some stand out performances in Bahrain, Canada and Austria. Has impressed with his speed on those occasions but needs to cut out the silly collisions and score consistently.
10) Vergne – flying under the radar but doing a solid job despite a weight disadvantage to his teammate (not sure if the car is now below the weight limit). Perhaps another underrated driver considering how good Ricciardo is proving to be.

[Keith Campbell]

I’m surprised noone has mentioned ‘designed to degrade’ tyres in F1 (unless i missed it). While i think this is gimmicky (providing an inferior product intentionally to make sure cars have different performance levels on the track), and has definitely been overdone at times (early 2013), i think on the whole the racing has been more exciting for it. Unfortunately during the Pirelli period there has tended to be one dominant team – Redbull 2011-2013 (Vettel) and Mercedes 2014, but if you look at the racing behind the dominant forces there has been a high level of competition, unpredictability and generally good racing. And this year we even have this at the front with the two Mercs.

Obviously there is constant fine tuning to get the balance right, and killing the tyres by pushing hard behind another car is an issue, but i find a lot of the criticism seems to be driven by perception of the racing rather than what is actually happening on track. At the start of races, or when cars come out of the pits alongside another, i’ve rarely seen a driver give up on position immediately in order to look after his tyres. And if a driver feels he can overtake, he will still push to try and make the pass – it’s only when this fails for several consecutive laps that it can have a detrimental affect and force the driver to go into ‘conservation’ mode. And in those cases, it’s likely that even with durable tyres he would have been unable to make a pass anyway (although perhaps could maintain his attempts for longer). So yes degrading tyres can lead to peaks and troughs in the racing, but in my view this was always the case.

[Keith Campbell]

I think he’s had a very good season so far (performance wise, not results wise), but he was equally impressive up until this point last season too. He was out-performing Ricciardo significantly at this stage last year (i remember Monaco and Canada in particular), but he faded quite badly the last half of the season compared to his team-mate.

I think he has talent, can be very good either in the wet or on certain circuits, but lacks a bit of dry qualifying pace compared to the top tier, and ultimately that could be his downfall. Not sure where he can go in F1 if he is not retained at Torro Rosso, apart from maybe a back marker team who could use his experience.

[Author]

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