Ten races down, nine to go. This year’s Formula One season has been dominated by just three men at the front: Lewis Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel. However, how are each of the drivers doing? With comparisons to their team-mates, in addition to looking at their respective position in the championship as well as their highest grid and race results so far, I give my own personal ratings on each of the drivers, and rank them from 1-20. Do you agree or disagree? Be sure to comment.
Formula One 2015 Half-Term Report
Mercedes
No. 44 Lewis Hamilton
Position: 1st
Highest Grid Result: 1st
Highest Race Result: 1st
Up until Hungary, Hamilton had been near-flawless this season. Two weekends where he was simply outshone by Rosberg in Barcelona and likewise (as well as a time penalty) at Austria aside, he had been the better of the two Mercedes drivers in every qualifying and race session so far. Despite his uncharacteristically woeful race at Hungary – in which I likened his performance to that of a Formula Three driver, he still brought the car home in the points. Until Hungary, he was on for at least a 9/10. His stand-out performance was at Bahrain, where he was able to bring the car home in first place despite having to put up with a charging Kimi Räikkönen and brake problems. It is also worth noting that compared to last season, Hamilton has absolutely trounced Rosberg in qualifying, and pole at Spa will give him the FIA Pole Position trophy with eight rounds to spare.
Rating: 8.5
No. 6 Nico Rosberg
Position: 2nd
Highest Grid Result: 1st
Highest Race Result: 1st
There have been times this season where Rosberg has been absolutely phenomenal – the start at Austria springs immediately to mind, whilst there are other times he has looked very mediocre indeed, such as struggling to fight the Williams cars at Silverstone and not looking like challenging either of the two Ferraris at Budapest. He has occasionally been beaten in qualifying by Vettel’s Ferrari, which should not be occurring in normal circumstances, and despite all this, he remains very much in the hunt for the championship. Turning around his qualifying form would be an excellent start to getting his championship challenge well and truly back on track, and three wins on the bounce from Spa would see him take the championship lead. It’s still all to play for, but it’s clear who has been the better Mercedes driver so far.
Rating: 6.5
Red Bull
No. 3 Daniel Ricciardo
Position: 7th
Highest Grid Result: 4th
Highest Race Result: 3rd
In a tricky, underpowered and unreliable car, Ricciardo has very much failed to shine to the same degree that he did back in 2014. Some of his overtaking moves this year have been questionable, and there are times where he has been simply beaten on merit by his younger team mate. There have been flashes of vintage Ricciardo though, such as battling through to sixth in Bahrain, and taking an emotional podium last time out at Hungary. With his young team mate finding some strong form though, the popular Australian may well need to up his game in the second half of the year.
Rating: 6.5
No. 26 Daniil Kvyat
Position: 8th
Highest Grid Result: 5th
Highest Race Result: 2nd
Hampered by reliability issues early in the year, Kvyat has slowly found his form, and has really come good in the last five races or so, where he led a Red Bull 4-5 at Monaco. Since then, he has outscored his team mate 40-26 and even took his first podium at Budapest despite a time penalty. He looks much more refined now compared to last year as expected and he is starting to fill in the hole left by Sebastian Vettel very well. If he keeps up this form, he may well step onto the podium again this season.
Rating: 6.5
Williams
No. 19 Felipe Massa
Position: 6th
Highest Grid Result: 3rd
Highest Race Result: 3rd
On a number of occasions this year, Felipe Massa has been back to his absolute best, with qualifying being a notable asset this year. On the days where his highly-rated team mate has been anonymous, the Brazilian has driven some superb races, including holding off Vettel’s Ferrari at Austria for his only podium of the season to date. Despite suffering bad luck which was out of his control at Bahrain and Canada, he finished in the points on both occasions. Massa has, if anything, edged out Bottas a bit this season, with the two being almost identical in terms of race performances.
Rating: 6.5
No. 77 Valtteri Bottas
Position: 4th
Highest Grid Result: 4th
Highest Race Result: 3rd
The young Finn who is hotly tipped to replace Kimi Räikkönen at Ferrari has not made as much of an impression as I would have expected him to this year. Like Massa, Bottas has also been unlucky at times, missing the first race due to a back problem, and suffering a puncture whilst in a strong position last time out. He had a strong run at Canada, capitalising on a spin by Räikkönen to take his only podium of the season to date. Both he and Massa have had their days where one has looked better than the other; they’re almost equally matched this year.
Rating: 6.5
Ferrari
No. 5 Sebastian Vettel
Position: 3rd
Highest Grid Result: 2nd
Highest Race Result: 1st
What a transformation is has been for Sebastian Vettel in 2015. Whilst he has not been completely perfect, he is beating his team mate in a similar fashion to Fernando Alonso in 2014, despite this being his first season within the team. Two brilliant wins at Malaysia and Hungary, paired with five other trips to the podium has made up a superb season so far. In fact, on the three occasions where he did miss out on the podium, two were events where his Ferrari suffered mechanical problems. The only other occasion was Bahrain, where he managed to break his front wing. He has over double the number of points of his team mate at this stage, and Vettel has a reputation for being stellar in the second half of the year. Is the title challenge on?
Rating: 9
No. 7 Kimi Räikkönen
Position: 5th
Highest Grid Result: 3rd
Highest Race Result: 2nd
The flashes of brilliance which were all-too-rare last season for Kimi Räikkönen have come at times once again for the Finn, but they are still far too infrequent. Whilst he was unlucky with a wheel problem in Australia and a power unit problem in Hungary, being knocked out of Q2 in Malaysia and Q1 in Austria (which led to a first lap crash) is simply inexcusable. His drive at Bahrain was absolutely sensational and controlled, but he failed to capitalise on Vettel’s problems in Canada and cost himself an almost certain podium in Canada. Whilst he has looked much more solid than he did last year, he is still not delivering the brilliant drives week in, week out.
Rating: 6
McLaren
No. 14 Fernando Alonso
Position: 15th
Highest Grid Result: 13th
Highest Race Result: 5th
Whenever it looks like things are about to go right for Fernando Alonso and McLaren, the car gives up. He missed the first race due to a concussion sustained in pre-season testing, and whilst he has only really matched Jenson Button in qualifying, he has generally run a bit better in the races. A well-timed Safety Car at Hungary helped him net a strong fifth place finish there. It has been tough to judge both him and Button due to the woeful reliability of the Honda power unit.
Rating: 6
No. 20 Kevin Magnussen
Position: 21st
Highest Grid Result: 17th
Highest Race Result: DNS
Rating: N/A
Kevin Magnussen tried to deputise for Fernando Alonso at the Australian Grand Prix, but the car wouldn’t let him.
No. 22 Jenson Button
Position: 17th
Highest Grid Result: 10th
Highest Race Result: 8th
After being paired with young team mates for the last two seasons, Button returned to being paired up with a World Champion in Fernando Alonso. Whilst he has fared a lot better in qualifying terms than he did to Lewis Hamilton, he has generally dropped back a bit in the races, and even came under fire for performing a move on Pastor Maldonado which is usually associated with the Venezuelan himself. He did, however deliver McLaren’s first points of the season at Monaco.
Rating: 5.5
Force India
No. 11 Sergio Perez
Position: 13th
Highest Grid Result: 7th
Highest Race Result: 7th
In the first six races of the year, Sergio Perez very much had the upper-hand over his team mate Nico Hülkenberg. A sensational drive at Monaco saw him qualify and finish in seventh place in a car which arguably did not belong there. However ever since the b-spec car has come out, he has been vastly outclassed by Hülkenberg, especially in the starts of the races and in qualifying. Perez was looking really good up until that point, but he has disappeared into the wrong end of the midfield in the last few races.
Rating: 6.5
No. 27 Nico Hülkenberg
Position: 9th
Highest Grid Result: 5th
Highest Race Result: 6th
It’s amazing what a trip to France can do for some people. Ever since he won at Le Mans – and ever since Force India brought their b-spec car to the field, Nico Hülkenberg has without a doubt been my driver of the last three races or so. He fought hard with the superior Williams of Valtteri Bottas for many laps at Austria, he beat Kimi Räikkönen’s Ferrari at Silverstone, and he was around the two Red Bulls at Hungary when his front wing gave up. He has also not been outqualified by his team mate in any of the last four races. If Hülkenberg keeps up this run of form, he could well be my driver of the entire year by November!
Rating: 7
Toro Rosso
No. 33 Max Verstappen
Position: 11th
Highest Grid Result: 6th
Highest Race Result: 4th
Max Verstappen has a seemingly unreal amount of potential. Whilst I believe that he is still far from being the finished product, there has been flashes of the new Hamilton, Vettel or Alonso – China springs to mind with those sensational overtakes, or his controlled drive to fourth – Toro Rosso’s best race result since Vettel was there, at Hungary last time out, both spring to mind, but he has not been without his flaws. His qualifying has been sub-par a lot of the time compared to his team mate, and he has been involved in a few accidents, most notably at Monaco.
Rating: 6
No. 55 Carlos Sainz
Position: 15th
Highest Grid Result: 7th
Highest Race Result: 8th
In my eyes equally as impressive, albeit for different reasons – is Carlos Sainz. The Spaniard has already shown some very strong qualifying pace and some superb racecraft so far, and has picked up a number of solid finishes despite a lot of technical problems and slow pitstops. He has not made anywhere near the same number of mistakes as Verstappen, and is impressing me just as much as the Dutchman is.
Rating: 6
Lotus
No. 8 Romain Grosjean
Position: 10th
Highest Grid Result: 5th
Highest Race Result: 7th
Almost always under the radar but quietly delivering superb performances has been Romain Grosjean. His qualifying has been nothing short of sensational – dragging the car into Q3 when he thought that he would fail to get out of Q1 at Hungary springs to mind, and he has almost always outshone Pastor Maldonado, who I feel has improved a lot from last season. The Lotus has without a doubt been the weakest of all of the Mercedes-powered cars this season, especially when reliability is concerned, but Grosjean has almost always been in the mix for some strong points. The Frenchman is very much my underrated driver of the season so far.
Rating: 8
No. 13 Pastor Maldonado
Position: 14th
Highest Grid Result: 6th
Highest Race Result: 7th
Up until Hungary, Maldonado was having a very solid, trouble-free (from his side) year with a few impressive performances to coincide with that. Whilst he has suffered much of the brunt reliability-wise at Lotus, he has not looked as good as Grosjean. However, his racecraft has shown improvements and for the most part this year, he has stayed out of trouble. Hungary however, where he picked up three penalties in the same race, is not what is expected of the Venezuelan who is aware that his seat for next year is not yet secure. It’s a bit unlucky for Maldonado that his improved form coincides with Grosjean’s vastly improved form.
Rating: 6
Manor
No. 28 Will Stevens
Position: 20th
Highest Grid Result: 17th
Highest Race Result: 13th
Stevens has quietly gone about his business and he has been the lead Manor driver for much of the season. He has had his moments though, with a few crashes in the races, and being beaten on merit in some of the recent races.
Rating: 4.5
No. 98 Roberto Merhi
Position: 19th
Highest Grid Result: 16th
Highest Race Result: 12th
Running both F1 and Formula Renault 3.5 this year has seen Merhi struggle to adapt at times. Whilst he has delivered Manor’s best race and qualifying results of the season so far, he has not beaten Stevens as frequently as the other way around, or as much as I expected. He has looked much stronger than he did at the start of the year though.
Rating: 4
Sauber
No. 9 Marcus Ericsson
Position: 18th
Highest Grid Result: 9th
Highest Race Result: 8th
Ericsson has shown genuine improvement from his one season with Caterham. He has developed into a solid if unspectacular driver, and has picked up points on a few occasions this year. He has been vastly outclassed by his rookie team mate and made a number of mistakes however.
Rating: 4
No. 12 Felipe Nasr
Position: 12th
Highest Grid Result: 8th
Highest Race Result: 5th
Felipe Nasr has without a doubt been my rookie of the year so far. No driver is further ahead of his team mate in the championship, and he has dragged Sauber very much back into the sharp-end of the midfield. He has had a few off-par weekends such as Malaysia, Canada and Hungary, but for much of the year he has been outstanding.
Rating: 6.5
Ranking:
- Sebastian Vettel
- Lewis Hamilton
- Romain Grosjean
- Nico Hülkenberg
- Nico Rosberg
- Daniel Ricciardo
- Daniil Kvyat
- Felipe Massa
- Valtteri Bottas
- Sergio Perez
- Felipe Nasr
- Kimi Räikkönen
- Fernando Alonso
- Carlos Sainz
- Max Verstappen
- Pastor Maldonado
- Jenson Button
- Will Stevens
- Roberto Merhi
- Marcus Ericsson
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