Article: Formula 1 Driver rankings - Part 1

In a two part series, im going to look at how drivers are performing in their half term reports. Places 26th - 11th

26.Daniel Ricciardo - Hard to write about him after one race, but he finished his first race anyway so at least he didnt bin it.

25.Narain Karthikeyan - Its hard to judge a driver in a HRT, but as bad as the car is i dont think Karthikeyan is doing much better, losing 7-1 to Liuzzi in Quali and being around 6 tenths slower is not a great statistic, being replaced for Ricciardo from Silverstone, will Narian be back, only you decide, ring 1850 get-narain-seat-back.

24.Pedro de la Rosa - Hard to judge, when he only raced once, on short notice to fill Perez’s post in Canada. Kept to 3 tenths with Kobi in quali which is quite respectable.

23.Pastor Maldonado - Pastor, Pastor, Pastor, i quite like him, he looks like a dangerous driver at times, but is Maldonado who is beating Barrichello 5-4 in Quali. His race pace is poor, with his best result 14th.

22.Vitantonio Liuzzi - Same as for his teammate, hard to rate him in the HRT, but he is doing a lot better than Karthikeyan, the definite no.1, will have the new challenge of the young aussie now of Ricciardo.

21.Jerome d’Ambrosio - Doing a good job in his first year of F1, Qualifying isnt great but in the race he has being able to keep Glock Honest, not a bad achievement.

20.Jarno Trulli - The Qualifying master is losing his touch, along with his strength as he has complained year long about power steering. Keeping nearly equal with his young teammate in race trim, Trulli isnt doing that bad.

19.Timo Glock - He may have out qualified his teammate 7-2 , but in the race its been 3-2 to Glock, with Jerome having the best finish position of the season so far with 14th twice. In a BBC build up piece, i think it was his engineer who said Timo is out driving the car so much that they have to constantly change the strategy.

18.Heikki Kovalainen - You cant help but like Heikki right ?, 8-1 in Quali and around 3 tenths faster, he is doing the job but in the race its nearly been level pegging with Heikki spending 193 laps ahead of his teammate to Trulli’s 176.

17.Jaime Alguersuari - As above, Jaime has been considerably behind his teammate, but two 8th places in Canada and Valencia,and 10th in Silverstone has him marginally ahead at Torro Rosso. The young spanish driver has been fighting for his seat with Ricciardo in the wings, but with Ricciardo gone to HRT, it is up Alguersuari to prove who will be driving in 2012.

16.Sebastien Buemi - To look at the WDC standings it looks like Alguersuari is just ahead, but in reality it is far from it, Buemi leads his teammate 7-2 in quali, and has finished ahead of his teammate in 4 out of the 6 races both have finished, But in the last three races.

15.Adrian Sutil - When hes not fighting off the track, he is trying to keep his young teammate behind him, who is upstaging him in Quali, but its Sutil’s experience thats getting him the finishes, he has ten points to the scots two. But overall has not been one of his best seasons.

14.Michael Schumacher - The old guy still has some trick, but his failure to get out of braking parts of his car are his downfall, we have seen some of the good, Canada and a fair bit of the bad too.

13.Rubens Barrichello - The most experienced man on the grid, is still keeping the young guns of today on their toes, as he has the young Venezuelan of Maldonado to contend with. At the start of the season the car has looked a dog, but Rubens has managed two ninth place finishes, while his teammate best is 14th, so its so far so good for Rubinho.

12.Sergio Perez - The Mexican one stopper, had a great start to 2010, with a points finish but Sauber was disqualified after the race for technical infringement, he has finished once in the points compared to his teammates six point finishes. The Mexican had a bad crash in Monaco and also missing Canada, but came 11th in Valencia, so he is coming back to himself.

11.Vitaly Petrov - The Russian has improved considerable in 2011, and is keep level with his experienced teammate Heidfeld with him spending 282 laps ahead compared to Heidfeld’s 236, But even after all that, it is Heidfeld who is ahead in points.

So who do you think deserves to be ranked 26th to 11th after 9 races

Thanks for reading , and part two will follow later this week.

 

Nice article, thanks for posting!

 

Nice one sportydan, was getting worried that you were going to do a post like mine and cause a few heated debates

This is much better though.

 

N/C. Daniel Ricciardo
N/C. Pedro De La Rosa
24. Narain Karthikeyan
23. Jarno Trulli
22. Jerome D'Ambrosio
21. Vitantonio Liuzzi
20. Pastor Maldonado
19. Rubens Barrichello
18. Felipe Massa
17. Sebastian Buemi
16. Jamie Alguersuari
15. Michael Schumacher
14. Paul Di Resta
13. Adrian Sutil
12. Timo Glock
11. Nick Heidfeld

Thats My opinion. I think you are too easy on guys in bigger teams and too hard on the likes of Kovalainen and Glock who could not do much more.

 

Great thread, easily worth a promotion to article status.

I mostly agree with that, but I wouldn't have Maldonado so low in the rankings. He started off quite poor but he's been doing a fine job recently and he's got the car into Q3 a few times now. He might not have any points, but Barrichello only has 4 and 6th in Monaco would have given Maldonado 8. Just like Maldonado, Di Resta is another person that has been outperforming his more experienced teammate, even though the WDC suggests otherwise.

I also think Heikki Kovalainen is doing a brilliant job and the fact that he's in a slow car shouldn't limit him to 17th in the rankings - I think he's doing a far better job than Barrichello for example.

It's a bit nasty to say this but I think Massa should be towards the top of the 11th - 26th category, simply because he's not driving the Ferrari as well as he should be. Alonso is a difficult benchmark and in fairness Massa has been close to Alonso at times this year, but overall he's not consistent enough and he's had some dreadful races this year.

 

I see what people mean about lower team drivers shouldnt be confined to lower spots, but its hard to know how to evaluate them against drivers who are finishing higher, anyone else want to give a go at ranking them, just to see everyone elses point of view.

26.
25.
24.
23.
22.
21.
20.
19.
18.
17.
16.
15.
14.
13.
12.
11.

 

26.Daniel
25.Pedro
24.Narain
23.Trulli
22.Glock
21.Ambrosio
20.Maldonado
19.Sutil
18.Massa
17.Luizzi
16.Jaime
15.Schumacher
14.Buemi
13.Heidfeld
12.Rubens
11.Heikki

Sorry if I keep changing my mind lol

 

Great article Sporty. Unfortunately I have to 'spread Rep' before giving it to you again.

Maybe I'm too fussy: there should be more people doing really decent articles like yours!

 

I also largely agree with Forza's modification of your assessment Sporty, but of course, this is very much down to personal taste. I'd also rank Glock a bit higher and Karthikeyan as absolute last, since it will not be long before Ricciardo is proving to be extra value.

P.S. Someone mooted whether Karthi will make a return: I have it on good authority that he will be in the seat for the Indian Grand Prix but my hope for F1 is that his reappearance is as brief as possible. (Sorry Narain. Nothing personal but I don't rate you enough to consider you a Grand Prix driver.)

 

I have a question guys. Why is Maldonado so different from di Resta? He is outqualifying his teammate frequently but has far to often slipped down on sundays. Similar story to paul i think yet Pastor ends up in most peoples bottom 5 and di resta in the top 10.

 

Di Resta's British.

 

You post that like your not guilty of the same crime

 

Im irish

 

This is an interesting question and apart from the obvious "he's British" answer, I can only speak for myself. I have far more knowledge of di Resta and know that his feedback is regarded very highly. He is also extremely level-headed and is not over-awed by the enormity of the F1 scene. This may well be true for Maldonado too but I have less knowledge of him, so he is more likely to dip below the radar for a good while yet…

 

I'm 4th generation Scottish so I'm biased to Paul don't be surprised if I put him at number 3

 

Sutil vs Di Resta

Quali : 2 - 7
Race : 4 - 3
Avg Finish : 11 - 12.8
Points : 10 - 2
Laps Ahead : 228 - 281

Barrichello vs Maldonando

Quali : 4 - 5
Race : 5 - 1
Avg Finish : 12.3 - 16.7
Points : 4 - 0
Laps Ahead : 248 - 186

 

Nice statistics there Sport.

I also have the feeling that di Resta has been a bit more unfortunate than Maldonado during the races and that his driving has been worthy of higher points than Sutil's. But hey, that's racing…

 

Interesting stats. It is clear that paul does better, but the end result points wise (taking different cars into account) is the same. Paul runs better for longer but inevitibly someting seems to go wrong. Often of his own doing to be fair. Maldonado is interesting. Some of his qualys have been great but he can't seen to maintain it.

 

Thanks Dan I wondered when your next article would come up

 

also Dan your article is on News-now! so you are representing the forum! Good work!
http://www.newsnow.co.uk/h/Sport/Formula One