Mercedes AMG clinched their first ever Formula One Constructors’ Championship with three races to go at the Russian Grand Prix despite the existence of double points. Having won all bar three of the Grand Prixs so far this season, and more often than not with a 1-2 finish, it is safe to say that this season has been dominated by the Silver Arrows of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg. This has not been the most dominant season by a team by any means, especially in terms of raw speed and percentage of victories, but this season will go down as one which could well spark a whole dominant period for the team which returned in 2010.
The first team to dominate Formula One was Alfa Romeo back in 1950 and in 1951. In the famous 159 which had dominated Grand Prix racing before the World Championship, Giuseppe Farina and Juan Manuel Fangio took the first two titles in the history of our sport. It also won ten races from the thirteen entered: a pretty remarkable feat.
Scuderia Ferrari would bite back on their Italian rivals however, as they took 13 victories in 16 races entered, all bar two with the first back-to-back champion—Alberto Ascari. Mercedes in their first Formula One appearance dominated the next two seasons when they eventually turned up halfway through 1954. Nine victories came from just twelve races in the hands of Fangio and Stirling Moss, with the Argentine taking two more titles. Fangio would dominate again in 1957, this time for Maserati, the team which he started the 1954 season with. At this point, a Constructors’ Championship was introduced for the following season and from that point it was clear to see who had the upper hand over their rivals.
The first team to really control Formula One in the 1960s was Lotus. Jim Clark achieved 100% of the points available in the Lotus 25, a feat which he would achieve again two years later. In 1967, Brabham thrashed the opposition with Jack Brabham, Denny Hulme and their Repco engine. No team would really dominate Formula One until Jackie Stewart’s partnership with Ken Tyrrell really hit its peak. In 1971, Tyrrell scored more than twice the number of points of nearest rival BRM, and achieved seven victories to BRM’s two. Whilst Lotus would take honours with Emerson Fittipaldi a year later, the trophies were split in ’73, Stewart taking the Drivers’ Championship and Lotus the Constructors’. No team really dominated for the next few years, although Ferrari were arguably the team to beat, but Lotus won half the races in 1978 in their innovative ground effect car.
The first team to absolutely dominate in the turbo era was Ron Dennis’ McLaren team. The MP4/2 won an incredible 12 out of 16 races that year. Williams would dominate the 1987 season with Nelson Piquet and Nigel Mansell but the term domination was to have a whole new definition in 1988. The McLaren MP4/4 was so fast, it was three seconds a lap quicker than the next car on one occasion. 15 wins and 15 poles from 16 races is an incredible achievement and to date it remains one of the most dominant seasons ever in Formula One. McLaren would be dominant again in 1989, but they would ‘only’ take ten victories that year. Williams would be the team to beat in the early 1990s, taking 20 wins between 1992 and 1993 and having another dominant season in 1996 with the emergence of Michael Schumacher being sandwiched. He helped Benetton to a dominant campaign in 1995 which saw them take 11 wins.
Michael Schumacher would lead Ferrari to a period of supremacy which exceeds all other periods of domination in the history of Formula One. Five Drivers’ Championships, six Constructors’ Championships and 63 victories between 1999 and 2004 is the longest sustained period of domination ever. The only times anybody came close were McLaren in 1999, 2000 and 2003 and Williams in 2003, but Ferrari still took those honours. No team would sustain a period of domination throughout a whole season for a while. Renault, McLaren and Brawn started the seasons very brightly in 2006, 2007 and 2009 respectively but we had to wait until 2011 for another season where one team thwarted the rest. Red Bull and their driver Sebastian Vettel made mincemeat of the likes of Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button as the team took twelve victories and set a record for the number of points scored in a season, 650. Mercedes could well beat that this year. This sort of domination would occur again just last year, with Vettel taking thirteen victories, nine of which were consecutive. Following this, I think everybody was hoping for a bit more competition this year but it hasn’t been like that.
On most circuits this season Mercedes have had a good half a second over the rest of the field, having taken pole in each race bar one this season (where both drivers made errors in the final qualifying session) and they have won every race bar three as well. In each race which they didn’t win, both drivers hit trouble (be it a mechanical problem or tangling with each other) and they could still beat McLaren’s record for the most 1-2s in a season, despite their reliability issues at points this year. What a truly outstanding season it has been for the boys and girls at Brackley. The W05 Hybrid will go down as one of the greatest cars in the history of the sport in a season which will without a doubt go down as one of the most thrilling.
#FormulaWon 🙂 pic.twitter.com/kwhMMllaGi
— MERCEDES AMG F1 (@MercedesAMGF1) October 19, 2014
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