Last week we compared the teammates of the first 5 teams in the constructor championship, starting at the last place. Now we continue with the other 5 teams and the first one up is McLaren.
McLaren
Last year Lando Norris already was the better driver at McLaren, but this year it was even worse for Daniel Ricciardo. Norris ended the season 7th in the driver championship with a total of 122 points. His teammate Ricciardo only managed to end up in 11th place, scoring 37 points over the season.
This also translates to the direct comparison between the two drivers. Over the season Lando finished higher than Daniel in 16 races and this happened 5 times the other way around. During qualifying the difference was even bigger, with Lando the fastest in 20 weekends and Daniel in 2. Ricciardo’ best result during a race in 2022 was 5th and 6th in qualifying, where Lando’ best was 3rd in both a race and qualifying.
In 2023 Daniel Ricciardo will not be driving any more for McLaren and will be replaced by Oscar Piastri.
Alpine
Based on the stats for the drivers of Alpine we can conclude that both drivers are evenly matched, with Esteban Ocon slightly ahead. We should also keep in mind that Fernando Alonso had 6 DNF’s over the season, while his teammate had only 2.
When comparing the drivers within the races, Ocon finished higher during 12 races and Alonso during 9 of them. Comparing the qualifying results it’s just the other way around, with Fernando faster at 12 weekends and Esteban at 9.
The driver from France finished with an 8th place in the world championship one position higher than Alonso did, probably because of the many DNF’s Alonso had. In the end Ocon scored 11 points more than Alonso.
Fernando’ best season result was a 5th place, where he finished 3 times; the British Grand Prix, the Belgian Grand and the Brazilian Grand Prix. His teammate Ocon did a little better with a 4th place during the Japanese Grand Prix.
Mercedes
The constructor champions of 2021 are now in 3rd place in the championship. Last year Lewis Hamilton drove along Valtteri Bottas, since this year George Russell is his new teammate. Russell had a great first year at Mercedes, finishing higher than his teammate during 12 out of 22 races. In qualifying Hamilton was the faster of the two Mercedes drivers, finishing higher in 13 qualifying sessions.
If we take a look at the driver championship, George was again the better of the two drivers. Russell finished in his first year for Mercedes 4th in the championship with a total of 275 points. Lewis Hamilton scored 35 points less than his teammate did and finished in 6th place in the world championship. Russell also was able to score his maiden pole position and win. Hamilton didn’t have a pole position and didn’t win a race, which was the first time in his career he didn’t win a race during a season.
Ferrari
With a great start to the 2022 season, the team from Italy finished second in the constructors championship. When comparing the two drivers from Ferrari we see a clear winner in Charles Leclerc. Fair to say that Leclerc had 3 DNF’, while his teammate didn’t finish the race on 6 occasions.
With the direct comparison during the race weekends, Leclerc finished higher during 12 of them and in the qualifying the driver from Monaco was faster at 15 weekends. This is also visible in the driver championship. Charles finished in 2nd with a total of 308 points and Carlos in 5th with 246 points.
Carlos Sainz was on the podium 9 in 2022, with 1 victory. The other Ferrari driver won 3 races, with a total of 11 podiums. Leclerc was the fastest during qualifying for 9 Grand Prix’, 6 more than his teammate from Spain.
Red Bull
The last team we’re going to compare the teammates of is Red Bull. Red Bull hadn’t had a great start with a double during the first race of the season and 2 DNF’ for Max Verstappen during the first 3 races. This all was going to change. If we take a look at the stats, the driver from the Netherlands was very dominant during the 2022 world championship.
He finished higher than his teammate during 17 out of 22 races, during qualifying it was even better where he was the fastest driver in 18 Grand Prix’. The world champion scored 149 points more than his teammate did. With his record breaking 15 race wins, he won 13 races more than Sergio Pérez.
The driver from Mexico was 11 times on the podium and scored 1 pole position. His teammate beat him also based on these stats. Verstappen was 17 times on the podium and had a total of 7 pole positions.
The 2023 season will start on March 5th with the Bahrain Grand Prix.