Still, it’s my column so I get to vent here. I won’t too much though. Instead, I’ll reflect on the fact that Brazil didn’t make it into the final shortlist but was still a highlight when there was far less riding on the race outcome at that point of the season is a sign of encouragement in my book.
The first year of new regulations so rarely provides a close field. It tends to be the starting point at which the competitive order is at its most stretched and the following seasons see a convergence as long as there is stability in the rules.
Even in a cost cap era that should be viewed as the case because the scale of this year’s regulation change was just so immense, to have a field spread of just 1.3 seconds from fastest to slowest across all 20 cars in Q1 in Abu Dhabi is pretty remarkable. All ten teams scored points inside the first four races, and all could boast multiple top-ten results.
It’s a great starting point for a more competitive field, especially so when you take into account the fact that those at the bottom of the standings get more car development time than those at the top, and all teams are enjoying improved financial performance fuelled by growing interest in the sport and the financial regulations.
Now, I might be unhappy about the race of the year shortlist, but in fairness none of the categories were simple to populate.
Take ‘Driver of the Year’ for example. You can look down the majority of the grid and find standout performances across the field. The frontrunners are more obvious, but if we look at Haas then alongside Magnussen’s epic pole and brilliant opening few races was the pair of top tens from Mick Schumacher mid-season that made him look every bit a match for his team-mate.
Or the Williams drivers, with Alex Albon somehow taking a set of tyres almost the entire distance in Australia, while Nicholas Latifi then stuck his hand up to be retained with an excellent performance at Silverstone.
Valtteri Bottas’s renaissance at Alfa Romeo, Esteban Ocon’s faultless drive to fourth in Japan, Pierre Gasly’s top five in Baku, Sebastian Vettel’s epic fight back through the field in the United States, the list goes on.
Not everyone hit those highs regularly of course – for some they were very much the exception rather than the norm – but they all contributed to the majority of races being far from boring.
I was deliberately trying to avoid those on the ‘Driver of the Year’ shortlist but I do have to mention Lando Norris as the only driver from outside the top three teams to score a podium this year. If nothing else to emphasise just how rare it was for a completely mixed up race.