Welcome to The Gurgler’s 2021 F1 Season Power Rankings – our way of using various F1 based stats to answer the question of really who is the best driver in F1 so far in 2021 – and this edition is for the 2021 Austrian Grand Prix Ratings.
We have already provided our thoughts on the race, along with a description of the race and more.
Read the 2021 Austrian Grand Prix Race Review here.
But our 2021 F1 Season Power Rankings goes a little bit deeper than just points scored on the Sunday. We take on board Free Practice, Qualifying, performance in relation to team mate, fastest lap, and a few more stats that are attempting to highlight a driver outperforming the car.
A full explanation on what is included and the points awarded is below the visuals.
Our 2021 Austrian Grand Prix Ratings has more than just a score, we have the race results, season progress, and so many F1 based points of interest.
Enjoy.
2021 F1 Season Power Rankings – R9 2021 Austrian Grand Prix Ratings
Here is the breakdown of the best and blurst driver from the most recent race.
No surprise it is Max Verstappen at the top of the charts and as per the race results was miles in front of everyone else. And like the Championship he’s clearing out.
His score of 92 is getting close to the perfect 100% weekend, according to our points system.
Lando Norris is catching Lewis Hamilton for second, which makes sense given the current trajectory of both.
2021 F1 Season Power Rankings Progress – Martini Medal Driver of the Year
Here are the current overall standings for our Driver of the Year winner – the Martini Medal. Named in honour of one of F1’s most unsung heroes – Pierluigi Martini of Minardi fame.
Max Verstappen extends his lead of our Driver of the Year points and is starting to look uncatchable.
Lando Norris is one good GP away from stealing second.
Introduced this week is a visual which shows the rolling points total and position of each driver within it. Some upper midfield movement.
2021 F1 Season Power Rankings – Other Interesting Stats
In case everything we have offered up isn’t enough, here is the best of the visuals from the F1 season so far.
TEAM MATE H2H
Here are the H2H results for the season so far.
Note that for the race we only count it when both drivers finish, unless the retired driver’s retirement was self inflicted as judged by us.
Pierre Gasly and George Russell continue the only 100% records in qualifying. Mick Schumacher, Max Verstappen and Lando Norris lead the race H2H with the near perfect 7/8.
A quick look at Bottas v Perez for the second drivers shows that Bottas is ahead of Perez for H2H against their team mate. But that might say more about the number one than the number two.
QUALIFYING AVERAGE GRID POSITION + DISTANCE FROM POLE
So who is the most consistent qualifier? The closest to pole position overall time-wise? What’s gap between the team mates?
All of that is answered below. But here are the barely interesting facts.
Just four drivers remain 100% Q3 compliant in qualifying – Max Verstappen and the two Red Bull drivers, plus Lando Norris after Charles Leclerc grabbed his first Q2 for the season.
Max Verstappen has yet to qualify outside of the top three.
Pierra Gasly racks up a Devil with three sixth places on the grid in a row.
Daniel Ricciardo really is unlucky at the moment. He has qualified 13th three times from the last four races. Either that or he’s having an ordinary season. Ricciardo leads the second pack with a large gulf forming between the top seven qualifiers at the rest. According to % from pole.
RACE – FIRST LAP NET PROGRESS
Who’s gaining or losing on the first lap? Well Kimi Raikkonen continues to be the first lap king. Another five places in the Austrian Grand Prix sees his tally move to 22 places gained for the season so far and nione places in the last three races.
Although Pierre Gasly was unlucky with his incident in the Styrian GP costing him a top starting position to back of the grid, his season stats show he has yet to improve on any first lap this season. More of the same this weekend.
You have to go back as far as eighth to see any first lap gains or losses and it was for Mr Saturday. Who knows, a better start and he might have got that first point for Williams. He’s runnign out of time before he goes to Mercedes next season.
At least Daniel Ricciardo is making up for some qualifying dross with good starts lately.
FREE PRACTICE RESULTS
For no good reason in the Free Practice results.
If you combine overall Qualifying (after Q3) and Free Practice, Max Verstappen has only been outside the top three in four sessions this season. 89% of this season’s sessions.
Down the other end, Nikita Mazepin has spent two thirds of his season in last place.
Guanyu Zhou takes over as the best performed ring-in with 14th, just three spots behind Ocon.
Roy Nissany has improved to be better than Mazepin.
2021 F1 Season Power Rankings – Points Explanation
Here’s how the points work this season. Essentially the perfect race (Win from Pole, Fastest Lap, thrash team mate, best in race etc) should amount to the perfect 100 points.
FIRST LAP GAINS +0.5pts per position gained -0.5pts per position lost.
CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS – 25pts to 1pt as per World Championship
BEAT TEAM MATE (RACE) – 10pts (if both finish or other driver got self inflicted DNF)
FASTEST LAP – 5pts – 1pt for top five drivers.
GRID POSITION TO RACE POSITION – formula +/- relative finish to grid
BEST OF THE REST (RACE) – 5pts to 1pt – top five non Mercedes-Red Bull drivers
QUALIFYING – 20pts to 1pt – Grid Position 1 to 20.
BEAT TEAM MATE (QUALIFYING) – 5pts
BEST OF THE REST (QUALIFYING) – 5pts to 1pt – top five non Mercedes-Red Bull drivers
GREAT/GRAPE – 5pts Great 2pts Honourable Mention -2Pts Dishonourable Mention -5Pts Grape
BEAT TEAM MATE (QUALIFYING) Time Gap – Formula for % beaten team mate by
BEAT TEAM MATE (QUALIFYING) Position – 0.5 Pts for every position team mate is beaten by. 0 points for second car.
FREE PRACTICE HERO – 10Pts to 1Pt – Average Position across all three practice sessions.
WIN FROM POLE – Bonus 5 Points
WIN FROM POLE WITH FASTEST LAP – Bonus 10 Points
