My 2023 Formula 1 Mid Season Driver Ratings

all right all right all right the summer break is upon us and we have once again arrived to that point where I pretend to know will same as last year and the year before that and the year before that I think we're gonna take stock of the opening 12 races in what has been a gloriously competitive season of Formula One and grade the drivers on just how good or terrible they have been thus far grading them from a to F you know same old stuff we're gonna do this in ascending order of where they are in the driver's standings sort of we're so accustomed to seeing an unfairly talented Dutchman in an unfairly fast Red Bull finishing at the top of the pile all the time this year so it would be kind of nice that this list does not start off with that Dutchman but rather with another Dutchman one that hasn't quite had the same amount of success what started out with so much promise ended up in a miserable puddle on the floor Nick defreeze was dropped by Dr helmet Marco in just 10 races in a speed run that nobody celebrated when you're dropped in 10 races yet someone like Scott speed was kept on for a year and a half that does kind of tell you how well this whole ordeal went this is no use beating around the bush here it was not a good campaign in any stretch of the imagination sure he wasn't given enough time but there was no indication it was going to get any better as the season went on the occasional out qualifying of his teammate doesn't necessarily make one the bee's knees in this game even if you do come in as a world champion across multiple disciplines like he did of course we'll never know if he would have fulfilled his potential it was a brutal axing and this is a bit of a brutal rating but it kinda has to be considering his replacement did a little bit better when he was brought into the fold when news broke that Daniel Ricardo was returning to the Formula One grid the whole world leapt to their feet and celebration the honey badger is back ready to kick ass and take names it is a little bit difficult to do that in a car that has less balls than a eunuch but he did beat his teammate on his first time out and oh boy not even Marco's nitpicking post race could dampen the spirits on the performance by the greatest Australian driver to ever be called Daniel Spa wasn't totally convincing but he did at least avoid the temptation to throw himself into the barrier which is a plus when given thought it may have only been two races but with the tasks set before him to perform like he did it's only fair that he gets a rating like this and it's also only fair that Logan's Sergeant doesn't get a rating like this all the way through the junior ranks this dude had an unusual capacity for suddenly becoming an absolute Speed Demon whenever the championship that he was racing in turned up to Silverstone so obviously come the British Grand Prix I was expecting this lad to take pole position and win the race by 89 laps but that didn't happen in fact it wasn't even close his performance there was Aiken to what it had been for most of the year which was disappointing he has shown glimpses of speed here and there his problem however is stringing everything together which is understandable these cars are quite fast and Corners tend to come at you faster than life does he is the type of driver that just needs a little bit more time than others and he would come good but exactly how much time are Williams willing to afford him and with other drivers lurking around they could add to William's desperate struggle to recoup the Glory Days of the 80s and the 90s so Sergeant needs a strong second half of the season if he's going to convince the world that he's a better driver than say Kevin magnussen although that dude hasn't been amazingly flash lately either for a dude who last year drove many a viking effort he's almost gone out of his way to completely just appeared this year it's not as if he's caused house any particular problem it's just that at times you kind of forget that he's on the grid at all and has instead wound up on Gardner's Island which completely boggles the mind it's not very often that Magnuson is even in the same postcode as his teammate in qualifying his race Pace as a whole may not be bad but when your only real competition in this game is your teammates and the only highlights from the team generally come from said teammates it doesn't bode well for years kmag really needs to up his game heading into zanvort because there are others out there who will want the drive who could pay for the drive and would be worthy of the drive of course replacing one with a rookie doesn't always work sometimes it does take time like it did with yukitsunoda another driver who was in desperate needs of impressing the Sith lord of the Formula One Paddock so Notice season has been a mixed bag so far on one hand he triumphed over one of the greatest prospects to come out of the go-karting scene since humans started racing motorized tin trays on the other hand he has had his moments with his brain vacated him not that they're common enough to make her start thinking about him getting the boot from avatari or whatever they're going to be called from next season the Red Bull seat may just be Beyond reach for him but he's done enough so far to justify remaining in the sport for at least a little while longer provided he can keep his experience teammate honest for the remainder of the year the same almost applies to joggle on you almost since his debut last year rather than stagnating in a mirage of bottom Five results garnish with the occasional 15th placing Joe is more than proving his worth at sauba he's certainly not been left for dead by his teammate but if you were to take things at face value he is losing the battle to him in qualifying and in the race looking into the results the margin is nowhere near bad enough to have the Swiss bosses look at replacing him however if he's to remain at sauba in the Years where it's set to become Audi he'll most likely have to improve upon what he's done because yes it has been good you can definitely see the potential there and some of those performances this year have been very impressive such as in Hungary where he qualified on P5 but it's not as if he's beating his teammate very often and with a wealth of drivers trying to break into the series and others with better results moping around trying to stay in it Joe will need to search for that little bit extra to distinguish himself as someone who without question belongs on the Formula One grit a good place to start is to consistently beat his teammate valterry bought us ah yes good old valtteri it's quite hard to write up a review for the sled because apart from hitting all the marks that he needs to he's been about its unspectacular as a rainy day in Scotland I'm not sure what people were expecting of botas this year but he has been winning the teammate battle against Joel so his place in the team is beyond question but I don't know I guess there are some other drivers out there that I would rather see in his place because I am a vindictive bastard like that because aside from his overwhelming urge to share his cheeks with his peeps there's not much he's doing wrong he is winning the qualifying battle he has at most outraced his teammates and he hasn't played hooky with the team's no claims bonus he's just the boring choice I guess a little like Nico hulkenberg or at least that was the attitude when it was announced that he would be replacing Mick Schumacher for the 2023 season duhas really think that they're gonna get much better results out of this old washed up has been with a phobia of podiums well the first round in Bahrain arrived and that's when fans all around the world were reminded of who Nika hulkenberg actually was a really [ __ ] quick driver and it turned out that Haas had made a really good purchase a constant presence in Q3 with his performance in Canada being a real eye-opener I don't care about any grit penalty manster serves his props he came violently close to his Maiden podium in Melbourne but of course ain't no way the motor racing gods are going to allow the skin to take the trip upstairs not then not ever so why then am I not about to say that this lad is the greatest thing since sliced bread well come the race time Hulk just disappears some of that is almost certainly down to the car but we don't have time for rational thinking on this channel either way however this has been a very good year that's far for Nico hulkenberg he certainly has been the MVP of his team and Alex Alban is the MVP of his the same way that Luca doncic is carrying the maps Alexander albon is carrying Williams that may seem bitly unfair but considering how big the gaps are to his teammate in qualifying it's about as fair and civil as I'm gonna get on the matter aside from his somewhat unhealthy Excursion into the sandbox in Melbourne albon this year has been freaking amazing demonstrating a lot of what he can do with some very good qualifying results and even better race results Williams still aren't out of their rut no but albon is extracting about as much as he can out of it and that's all you could really ask of him and it's no surprise that he has been linked to the likes of Ferrari because his place in Formula One right now is beyond question to go from an alpha tari suit to Red Bull to drown at Ripple then recede back to Elissa team and then to prove his worth as a comeback worthy of Praise it's pretty much what Pierre gasly did too it's why he got that new gig at Alpine a French driver at a French team is a recipe for disaster on its own throwing a French teammate and you have the angry Radiance for a civil war that has happened on occasion this year but for the most part the drivers haven't been performing well enough whenever it didn't do that most frencher things and set the nearest car on fire a la Baku the main question we want to ask however is Pierre gasly delivering the goods this year Well considering that he's about even with his teammate in the qualifying battle that Scott account for something he's definitely had some good moments this year such as the podium placing in the spa Sprint race and he has been a constant presence in the points in more than enough races he has been ahead of his teammate by the time the chicken flag had fallen it's not all the time however it is quite hard to get the upper hand on Esteban ocon many a driver of tries and many a time has resulted in a few Choice words of Spanish being used that the engineers politely pretend not to understand this year at Alpine okon is leading the way as the more experienced driver of the two you would think that this would spell out consistency but his consistency this year really has been like mashed potatoes some bits are lumpy as hell not all of it has been his fault but some mistakes have been needless his Podium and Monika however deserves every bit applauded that it does a great performance that's been the high point of the Season thus far for Alpine and with the team imploding from within managerily will probably be the high point of the entire season unless the second half of the Season throws us a Mickey Mouse race and the walls of the track Echo to the sound of the songs of angry men Maybe demons I can give them that like it did back in 2021 when McLaren broke through for their first win in almost 10 years actually that team has been storming this year and no small part thanks to the drivers in no small part thanks to Oscar pastry heading into the season I made the prediction that Oscar piastro would either fail to live up to the hype and become a bust or would exceed expectations and show the entire world that he was as good as formula Regional Formula 3 and formula 2 indicated guess which one he did uh yeah the second one the good one although it wasn't immediate the ashtray has definitely emerged as one of the surprises this year with a stellar run of form when McLaren decided to wake up once they ventured back to the British Isles people were getting a better look into how he was progressing in his rookie year what we began seeing was that despite still being a little bit green and up against a skunk and fast teammate he was holding his own his performances were damn solid in qualifying and in the race you get the sense that the student is almost bulletproof when it comes to any form of pressure all eyes were on after the events of last year here we are 12 months later and especially with the last three or four grand prix almost no one is questioning McLaren's decision to hire him he's been a standout thus far and there's surely more to come it's funny because in his rookie year Lando Norris wasn't quite as lauded yet in the year 2023 he's one of the hottest commodities no no wait that's not what I meant Lando been linked to virtually any team on the grid with the brain pen and sheet of paper tells you enough about what type of form he's in right now very fast very good even at the start of the year when the MCL 60 was slower than a dog in a rug Lando was still putting in some exceptional drives and that's the power of these types of drivers those exceptional ones the ones that stand out even with crap cars they could still make themselves noticeable drives such as a Melbourne where he climbed through the field surface proof that if McLaren could get their act together he can start challenging for wins at least whenever the rb19 takes a day off sure the last few races have been great for the team and for Lando we are noticing his performances a little bit more but all of this season not just the last three or four races he has been proving his worth there is a very good reason why everybody is chasing a signature there's also a very good reason why nobody is chasing Lance trolls once the Lancelot has to be one of the most frustrating drivers on the entire grid there are brief glimpses of potential where you could see him hoisting another trophy above his head but more often the knots you see him trailing down the grid whilst his teammate is up ahead and getting the Lion's Share of the team's points some of the performances this year have been flat out bad yeah I know who his teammate is but if you have a guaranteed place in this sport at least act like you can hang every four or five races his pace is fine I guess but that's definitely not enough his formula one career has been going on for longer than most already he's been with this particular team since 2019. there's not a lot of excuse left although I'm not sure Big Daddy has the same opinion it seems to him that they're about Even Stevens but they're hot they're they're not you might be able to argue that with Ferrari but even that's a can of worms exhibit a being the opening race and Bahrain where the engine and Charlotte class car did that most Italian of things destroying itself with an earshot of a good result the clearest performance this year so far has been checkered we've seen his Pace oh boy we've seen his Pace he's fast really damn fast but he has gotten unhealthy record of spinning off at high speeds into the barriers which is not ideal his results aren't helped with Ferrari's futile attempts to understand basic strategic calls or pit stops or common sense or even its own existence but as mentioned before he doesn't help himself sometimes twice this year he has been on Pole Position one of them may have been by default but so what he's also the only Ferrari driver to get onto the podium three times in fact but while this is all very flattering it's not as if Carlos signs has been a complete dud this year although his lack of awareness sometimes doesn't make him popular outside of Madrid as of now it appears that Carla signs his tenure at Ferrari is nearing the end although not for lack of performance the battle between he and Leclair is closer than many would like to believe or care to admit he has shown his speed this year and whatever he's doing to avoid any ferrari-isms in that team it's working however he is in a losing effort in a qualifying battle and he hasn't stood on the podium thus far this year it seems he lacks that little bit extra the sharp obsesses and thus while the results have been very good I haven't been exceptional really both Ferrari drivers have had their faults this year but if anyone can make sense of The Messer Ferrari George Russell probably isn't the guy because right now he's in a mess of his own one of the biggest lies told last year was that Russell was destroying his teammate he wasn't he never was what he did do was run Mighty close to him and was a much more worthy advertree than what Captain Butt Cheeks was in his entire run at Brackley this year it was expected that he would build upon that and to help take Mercedes back to the promised land we're winning 35 out of the 22 races that year would be good enough instead though he has struggled struggled to get his head around the car and especially so after the updates you can chalk that up to any number of things but excuses were not extended to his teammate this time last year and they won't be extended here either you've got to be able to adapt in this game and right now he's lacking that three to four tenths needed to bridge the gap to his teammate and silly errors like in Montreal did not make him look like a million bucks it's been a disappointing year for him so far but despite the soul searching that Mercedes has gone through in the past 18 months with the poor buggers having to scrape through with podiums and the occasional win they do still have sir Lewis Hamilton the boy from stevenage still reckons he's got a few good years left in him and the Top Flight of Motorsport and yeah I do believe them because so far this year he showed no signs of slowing down it seems that despite the Merc not being a rocket ship and thus not to his liking he's still putting in some stormy drives almost every single time he goes out on track his proposition in Hungary wasn't really a return to form because he's had formed for the entire year and he's extracting the most he can out of that Merc much more so than his teammate who apparently destroyed him last year there's not much he could say about his performances other than this is Sir Lewis Hamilton this is why he's as lorded as he is because you know damn well that that Merc can't really be maxed any more than it is right now by him sure he hasn't won a race this year but it's not just about winning in Formula One it's about performing with what you have and right now you'd either have to be blind or stupid to find much fault with them Ditto 2 for Fernando Alonso for 89 000 years Alonso has been beset with rubbish team switches and even more rubbish cars once he signed the dotted line for once it would be nice if the lord of the eyebrows could have a card that functioned properly and hold itself together long enough so that it can get to the Finish Line as well this year Aston delivers and oh boy it was beautiful to see Fernando vying for podium's on a consistent basis seeing just how damn good he is behind the wheel that was before the team lost its way around 10 races in to say he's been the better driver at Aston Martin this year would be a grave understatement this is the Fernando Alonso we all know and love a legend of the sport someone whose stats do no justice and someone who should be winning more someone else who should be winning more is Sergio Perez but for very different reasons Red Bull knew exactly who they were hiring at the tail end of 2020. Checker was putting in some incredible drives in the racing Point including a win in the Saka Grand Prix where he climbed up through the field and achieved The Impossible Viva La Mercedes Netflix curse since coming in he has shown morsels of potential and at the start of the year he had been muted as a championship rival to his teammate but then he was reigned in which fair enough his teammate is an inconceivably talented monster however what is expected of him in a car that's so strong is that he picks up those Podium positions and doesn't get knocked out before Q3 so far he has struggled to do that which suggests two things that either the Red Bull is a tractor which I struggle to believe or that checo himself is struggling if the latter is the case that's the last thing that Rebel needs if they turn up to 2024 and a rival team has got this together we know what checo can do Red Bull knows what he can do he knows what he can do he knows that he knows what he could do therefore should do what he knows he needs to rekindle that fast because Dr helmet Marco has got quite an itchy foot right now right now his teammate Matt the one thing I keep on hearing about the season is about how strong the Red Bull is how much of a rocket ship it is and how boring the season is something that needs to be said more however is just how goddamn good Max has been lately sorry Richard Bradley yeah he's always been good but he's just been a complete robot this year you can have this guy start a race when it's finished and he'll still find a way to win such Precision such speed such Perfection yeah the car's good but bruh it's kind of hard to be mad at his winning you can't have to sit back and admire the performances sure it's not exactly exciting but all the dominant seasons of Formula One never are exciting aren't they one day it will stop all dominant streaks do but for the time being like all those other times just appreciate the greatness that we are witnessing unfold before our eyes provided he doesn't keep on stepping on his own dick over the radio so that's where I reckon they're all at right now will any of this change in the second half of the Year well we'll see [Music] thank you

Channel: Josh Revell

Views: 341,183

Keywords: f1, formula 1, f1 2023, driver ratings, f1 2023 driver ratings, f1 2023 driver gradings, max verstappen, lewis hamilton, fernando alonso

Id: DSFmEpB8T3E

Length: 18min 50sec (1130 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 03 2023