🇫🇷 Formula 1 2021: R7 – Staying positive

@LandoNorris

Another exciting race in the 2021 season saw Max Verstappen claim maximum points after Red Bull did to Mercedes in Spain – out-thinking the champions by turning a one-stop race into a two-stop and allowing their star driver to slice through any resistance. Red Bull are showing that they’re capable of learning, catching and beating Mercedes at their own game – the tense radio messages near the end of the race from Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton to their engineers the sounds of frustration.

But while the top of the order is shaking out, after seven rounds, the first third of the season might be enough time to look at another debate – that of consistency.

It’s difficult to define, but consistency might be best seen by drivers that continually finish near the front on a regular basis. But how do you quantify that? It’s easy to say that the Mercedes and Red Bull cars are quick, but there must be a better way that takes into account car ability and qualifying performance too.

Here’s a way of doing it – +/-. By comparing qualifying results with race finishes, we might be able to get a measure of consistency, comparing the various divisions in the field and seeing who is outperforming the car. The measure isn’t perfect, as you can see from the drivers right at the front and right at the back.

Simple formulas here. Take qualifying performance, race performance and subtract the two, with retirements counted as -21. Here, I’ve charted the big two teams and this immediately shows the limitations in the data – if you’re used to qualifying high up, then you have the most to lose because there are so many positions below you. Perhaps the most useful conclusions can be drawn from Sergio Perez. The “other” Red Bull driver has turned it around from a poor start, culminating in a win at Baku and a podium in France. The other conclusion is from Lewis Hamilton and how consistent he really is with +1s, -1s, if you disregard his magic button in Azerbaijan.

Likewise, it makes sense for the back markers to skew mostly positive as they benefit from retiring drivers and incidents. Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovanazzi seems to be the biggest winner here, especially as the only one in this graph who has scored points. George Russell, who normally manages to get into Q2, seems to have amazing one-lap pace in his Williams, only to be caught out in the race. Portugal and Azerbaijan being a couple of examples, but he can pick up the odd place, and finished in a season’s best of 12th at Paul Ricard.

Something else I noticed is the low number of retirements across the board this season, which hurts those late runners as they can’t sneak a point by just surviving.

Moving onto the lower mid-card of drivers and this group are generally able to finish higher than they qualify, with Stroll and Tsunoda showing they can slice through the field on race day. There isn’t one race where all of these drivers has done better in the race than qualifying. There’s at least one outlier and it might be evidence that they’re battling each other.

But it’s the upper mid-card that’s the most interesting, with some common themes. 

Lando Norris has been a model of consistency so far this season, with a scoring streak that no-one else on the grid can match and is the most positive driver in a race compared to his qualifying result. His teammate Daniel Ricciardo hasn’t quite been able to match that, but is also up there in the net positives. And looks like he might be starting to find his feet in the McLaren, especially with two races in Austria to come, even if the Red Bull Ring isn’t his best track (a third in 2017, but not much before or since).

The other net positive driver in this group is Sebastian Vettel, largely due to his excellent performance in Azerbaijan where he skilfully piloted his Aston Martin to second place. Like Perez and Ricciardo, there were teething problems as he adjusted to his new car and place on the grid, but he has been neutral or positive in the last four races and could be one to watch in Austria.

Ferrari are interesting, as they are largely seen as a team that has shown massive improvements in 2021. But both their drivers are net negative with Leclerc the most negative overall (along with Hamilton). The Monaco DNS isn’t counted here, but a major strategy error in France dropped him from seventh to 16th, while Carlos Sainz has been successful, most notably with a second in Monaco, but despite the increase in performance, there is definitely more to come from the Italian giants.

Pierre Gasly is difficult to compare with his rookie teammate, but the most obvious conclusion is like George Russell. He is excellent on Saturdays, but Sunday is a different story and he’s settling for cadging a handful of points each weekend. The only race he managed to finish higher than his starting grid position was Spain, when he stole the final point. But again, his narrative this season so far has been one of success, with Red Bull and Alpine (before Ocon was extended) rumoured to be sniffing around.

Here’s how everyone looks in one graph as a net +/- chart. Qualifying minus Race aggregated. 

Take a bow Lando Norris and Lance Stroll. The latter (and Tsunoda in third) are boosted by poor qualifying performances, while yes, that is the seven-time World Champion joint-last, sandwiched by two drivers who are top-10 in the Drivers’ Championship, which shows this absolutely is not a perfect measure, and if Hamilton hadn’t ploughed through Turn 1 in Baku, he’d be near the middle of this pack, but while the graph doesn’t tell the full story, one way in which this is accurate is how brilliant Lando Norris has been in 2021.

The British driver is the only one to score in every race so far this season, never finishing lower than eighth, sneaking a couple of podiums in the process. Here are his +/- results so far this year, compared with the first seven races from his previous two seasons on the grid.

You can see the progression is there from year to year. In his first season, he seemed happiest racing in qualifying, not really making a big impact on raceday, but in year two, the double header set the tone for him and he started to really get noticed, with the odd blip. In 2021, it’s clear that the challenge of Daniel Ricciardo, after being with Carlos Sainz, is the making of him – and he seems to really enjoy his job.

Norris is coming into Austria’s pair of races in form as Formula 1 rolls on through its season. Even France was able to deliver a good show, so who knows how weird it’s going to get in Austria?

PREVIOUSLY THIS SEASON:

🇦🇿 Round 6: The award for Best Supporting Driver

🇲🇨 Round 5: The enjoyment of a genuine three-way battle

📈 Formula 2, Formula 3 and W Series: Why F1's support races are great

🇪🇸 Round 4: Getting out-thought if not outfought

🇵🇹 Round 3: Portimão and the benefits of a rule change

🏁 The pros and cons of sprint qualifying

🇮🇹 Round 2: Max Verstappen and the Italian curse

🇧🇭 Round 1: Bahrain and comparing qualifying pace with 2020

🔮 Four odd predictions for F1 2021