I think Piastri and Gasly with the “all laps completed” (with 24 races mind you), and Gasly $0 damage across the full season are both honorable mentions.
I still feel Sainz is a bit underrated. He had a great season. I don't think many drivers would run Leclerc as close as he has. I think Leclerc is clearly the 2nd best driver on the grid. Losing 14-9 to Leclerc in qualifying, who is arguably the best qualifier on the grid is a very good effort. Losing 14-8 in the races is also nothing to sniff at. A lot of drivers would look average against Leclerc, but Sainz has held his own and has been consistently strong in 2024. Still a good top five though, Aldas.
He is the reason ferrari lost the constructors to begin with. They had a chance and with rookie mistakes in canada baku brazil (crashing out himself like a novice) ferrari lost. He then played victin in miami crying for 5 laps for piastri to get a penalty for a fair defense and then took him out of the race and got a light 5 second penalty. He then got lucky with max retiring in australia, adding to his career of fluke wins. Underperformed massively in belgium and italy. Got beaten by slower mercs in singapore and this was because of his rookie error in qualifying. 50+ points and ferrari easily win the constructors. When there is a championship involved, like this season and 2022, Sainz only appears for one race and disappears for the next 10 When he beats leclerc, leclerc then beats him for the next 5 races and deestroys him. Sainz can only beat leclerc by a few seconds.
No, he is not underrated. The car on this year suited on his driving style for the most of year as it was understeery which is completely against Charles's style and Charles beat him by such a big difference.
Totally agree, everyone acknowledges that Charles is the second best driver on the grid and arguably the best qualifier and yet Sainz doesn’t get recognised as one of the best driver on the grid, even tho he very often keeps pace with Charles
I want to give a special moment to Pierre Gasly. I think his performances, despite having a tractor for the majority of the races, have been brilliant, especially towards the end of the season! I think if Alpine continue to improve their car over the winter, Gasly is going to be right up there at the top of the mid field.
Facts Fernando has been one of the best drivers this year considering the machinery he has had amazing drives particularly Saudi japan China Qatar and many more
@best___0999 You speak as if the Haas had been worse than the Aston Martin this year, when the Astons have been the worst car alongside the Saubers in some of the last races of the season
@best___0999Literally everyone made mistakes this season. I'd say all the top drivers apart from George and Charles made more errors and were less consistent.
sainz deserves top 5 imo, he had a few low points and crashes and he wasn't as consistent as leclerc, but him only being a few points off piastri says a lot
Him being only a few points away from Piastri tells more about Oscar's lack of performance than Sainz's brilliance, even though Carlos has had a very good season
I think perez deserves a spot on this list. He was easily the best mclaren driver this year, allowing them to easily secure their first constructors championship in over 25 years
Thanks for giving Max’s P2 in Silverstone a shoutout 🤣 I’ve been championing that drive for months. I went and rewatched it last night and I totally forgot that he was probably 1 lap away from winning it too 🤣
george had a really good season if u u ask me, he gets a lot of hate, but he demolished lewis in quali and finished ahead of him despite the dnf in silverstone and dsq in belgium, aside from the mistakes in canada and australia he did good imo, altho merc basically forgot about lewis this season
I would switch Lando and George. Lando made lot of mistakes in races including defending race lead in first lap, and wheel to wheel battles. Whereas George beat 7 time world champ in the same car. He finished 4th (14 seconds behind race lead) in a race where LH44 pleaded to retire the car. Also Carlos is underrated, he lost many points in DNF's.
Max Verstappen is the the Formula World Champion and McLaren is the Formula Constructors World Champion. Fernando Alonso is the Formula 1.5 Champion and Aston Martin is the Formula 1.5 Constructors Champion.
Top 5 is really hard. Gotta leave out so many good drivers no matter who you pick. I have to agree with your 1-4, but could be swayed on 5. Alonso and Gasly did very well with the cars they had too.
I think Russel was ahead of Norris, and closer to Leclerc than he was to Norris. If you look at the results each driver got in relation to the car they had underneath them, Russel is easily top 3, very often got the best possible result he realistically could with the car he drove on each weekend.
I disagree. Russell has some great races but also underperforms in other races. I think he lacks consistency. The fact that Hamilton caught him in Abu Dhabi should never have happened. Kinda like Verstappen catching Perez in Miami 2023. That shows a difference in quality between the drivers. I am not sure where exactly that Mercedes was this year. Clearly 4th best car, but the gap between them and the top team was difficult to estimate.
Tbh I just don't see Russel beating Charles with the race pace he has. They are nearly equal in quali but Charles is more consistent and he is definitely clear in race craft and race pace. I just don't see george beating Charles, I don't think his race pace is even Sainz level
I totally agree about Sainz I certainly think he’s on Russell’s level, but I don’t think Piastri can be higher than 8th or 9th this season when he got slapped up by Lando. He is an incredible talent but not on Lando’s pace consistently enough, I’d have Gasly and arguably Alonso above him as well for this season
They both have had a good season. No more, no less. There are however atleast 5 drivers with a great season who have performed better through the whole season relative to the car they had.
Charles Leclerc is simply Ferrari's "not so secret" weapon against Max Verstappen. Hopefully 2025 will give us lots of wheel to wheel battles between these 2. It's entertaining when these 2 start fighting on track. Max is scared of nobody however, he respects Charles. Apart from a racing incident in the first lap in Austra, I can't think of any other on track battles that have gone wrong for him. So maybe the most clean driver in wheel to wheel battles this year as well?
If Aston Martin had 2 Strolls they would be 8th in the constructors, but they are 5th because Alonso has triple Stroll's points, almost the same percentage of Max vs Checo. With the tractor Alonso has driven he should be 5th on the list at least, or possibly behind Sainz, who is always so underrated. He is just less than half a tenth slower than Leclerc on average and not too far off in points with one less race
such a deluded alonso fangirl as usual. Why do you think drugovich isnt even in the car yet? One practice session goes and he already beat your finished idol in abu dhabi. Alonso has weak teammates so all of his deluded fangirls can make statements like this. They were faster than mercedes at the beginning of the year (moreso in china saudi and australia) i mean if stroll qualifies ahead of russell, that told you how fast the aston was to begin with. Alonso wasn't even amazing he put the most embarrassing performance in imola and even got beaten by stroll in half the races 😆
for me the most impressed i was is with Verstappens race iq, many see mexico as headloss but had he let Lando by Lando would definitely win and Max p4 losing 13 points, instead byt running wide and holding Lando, Lando lost the win and gained 10 points on Max. then theres races like cota too
charles is deffo my driver of the year after max, he almost got P2 in the WDC and most wins after max and lando and he had a top 5 in every race aside silverstone and hungary, bad strategy and taken out lap 1
I kinda think that George already has a contract ready to go. Both him and Toto have chatted in interviews about there being a longer contract in the past and George was recently talking about the 2026 engine in a podcast. I don't think he's worrying about a contract extension. Even though Lewis left, George made it so that Mercedes didn't fight that hard to keep him. I think he's got job security.
I agree withyour top 4 because its my top 4 too, and i think giving that 5th spot to nico feels right. I think he was great through whole season, but i also think Pierre and Fernando deserve to be highlighted. Carlos also was i think great this year
I don’t think George is under that much pressure. Mainly because I don’t see max ever being at that team, he’s either gonna stay at Red Bull or retire, no in between. George also got some great wins and I don’t see kimi standing up to him until mid 2026 at the earliest. George will be okay.
You talk about Hulk being 5th as if he is some diversity pick, while you could make a strong argument of him being the 4th best this year. Also i want to give a shoutout to Gastly and Alonso for 5th. In my opinion all these 3 drivers have been overpreforming compared to the car more than Russel
Agreed but lets face it, in all these lists everyone just has drivers in the best cars. The fact Hulk has found himself in this list makes it better than the vast majority.
Tough to narrow it down to 5 when there’s only ~20 drivers I’d personally put Gasly 5th, I think he took that car to the limit. Would also swap George and Lando
@ ragdolled? He won 2 races, a sprint, and got 8 podiums, raced every lap, had some incredible overtakes, and led Lando for the majority of Miami (Lando's first win) before getting unlucky, even though he didn't even have THE FULL UPGRADE. But it's just an opinion, dude.
@@4share643 He had a good car so of course he's got some decent results, I'm not trying to say he's a bad driver. But when compared to his teammate he did get ragdolled. Losing quali h2h 4-20 is bad, probably only Perez did worse than that this season. 0 poles vs 8 poles is also bad. Overall race pace diff is also quite big, Oscar did have a good run during the mid-season, but after the summer break he just wasn't good enough.
@@4share643Bro you are only mentioning Piastri's highlights. Let's talk about him BEING ABSOLUTELY MID in all races except Miami,Hungary,Spa,Monza and Baku and sprint races
#5 was indeed either Hulk, but Gasly wouldn't have been a strange pick either. You might like some others scrape off the WDC from the list, since that person is the biggest of all big winners anyway. Gives more room to consider the others in the field.
Well thought through Aldas. Lando/McLaren had their chance but couldn’t do it. It might be Oscar/McLaren for that team next year. Lando is quick enough but needs steel and utter determination to improve on this year.
Very good Video Aldas and not bad your Top, but I completely don’t agree with the fact to put Lando in the Top 5 and instead to not put Fernando in that Top, also don’t agree with the fact that Max had the 2nd overall best car this season, for me he had the 3rd overall best car and sometimes the 4th in some tracks like Monza, Baku, Mexico or Abudhabi. Lando don’t deserve to be on the Top 5 because since Miami he had a car to fight for the championship and to win it in the end, the McLaren wasn’t dominant but it was definitely the most consistent and solid car of the Top 4 because they were strong in every track (except Las Vegas), him, Oscar and the team lost a ton of opportunities, to know how bad their season his Lando was 52 points behind Max after his 1st win in Miami, after Abudhabi the gap increased into 63 points despite having had a faster car than Max’s car in those 19 rounds between Miami and Abudhabi (except Spielberg and Las Vegas), and like you said on the video the fact that he was more closer to lose the 2nd than to fight for the 1st it’s another very bad point and example from his disappointing season and doesn’t help to valorise and judge his performance overall, if one of the 3 world champions and even Charles would had that McLaren they would have won easily the championship with 2 or 3 rounds to go. For Fernando sadly the majority of the F1 community and fans are considering his season as normal where in reality it isn’t normal, the Aston had something similar to the Redbull, in the 1st part of the season it was the 5th best car and by far the best car of the midfield and more closer to the Top than to the midfield but since they came with upgrades in Imola they start to lose so much performance and they failed completely the development of the car, they didn’t find the solution and because of that they keep falling and falling until they end up being the penultimate best car just better than the Sauber, the other teams developed their cars and Aston stagnated, the typical Luck of Fernando Alonso 😂, and with that car he realised the miracles to put that green tractor more than 1 time in Q3 and to finish several on the Top 10 scoring points, maybe people see his season as normal because we are used to see him extracting of a car more than he’s capable, but it isn’t normal because to do that with 43 years old it’s immense, and when the car was competitive in the beginning of the season he made some incredible drives like in Jeddah, Melbourne, Suzuka or Shanghai when he was challenging the Mercedes, McLarens with a slower car. For the rest I agree, my Top 5 is : 1 Max Verstappen, for the same reasons you explained in the video. 2 Charles Leclerc, for the same reasons you explained. 3 George Russel, for the same reasons you explained. 4 Fernando Alonso and I explained why. 5 Nico Hulkenberg also for the same thing you said on the video. Honorable mentions : Pierre Gasly and Carlos Sainz.
The Lando hate has gotten too far. If you judge his season objectively and not in comparison to max who's literally one of the greatest drivers' oat, you'd see he had a really good season. There's a reason the Mclaren didn't look nearly as strong in piastris hands even tho he is a talented driver as well, and its Lando.
So best drivers top 5 - Best Oscar Piastri, 2nd best Danny Ric, 3rd best Jack Doohan ( I mean he didn't do anything wrong this year did he?), 4th best Valteri "Honorary Aussie" Bottas and finally 5th best Lewis Hamilton. Yeah I may be just a wee bit baised here! ;-)
Maybe 5th for Lando if we are stretching it, but 3rd is way too high. I get that he comprehensivly beat Oscar, but ultimately both of the McLaren drivers squandered a fantastic piece of machinery they had at their disposal. Lando just squandered it a bit less humiliatingly.
You are talking as if those McLaren's were 2023 Redbull levels of dominant when in reality it was probably the best overall car during a season by a very slight margin
@@pro_grapist there were far too many missed opportunities, what you say is true though. the mclaren was nowhere near as good as the RB19 but one of the advantages that mclaren had was actually having 2 drivers... you would think that they should have won more races than they really did.
@@pro_grapist I called it a fantastic piece of machinery, not outright dominant. That's the biggest issue: McLaren won in those few occasions when their car was truly dominant, but when they only had a small advantage (but an advantage nevertheless), they often managed to throw away those wins. So I'll stand by my point: McLaren absolutely squandered the potential of their car.
@patepulkkinenvtec2403 You say that McLaren drivers have humiliatingly absolutely squandered cars potential and that Norris is 5th best driver this season IF WE'RE STRETCHING IT. These claims imply that McLaren was supposed to just sweep both championships like 2023 RedBull. Yeah Lando and Oscar have done mistakes, but so have other drivers like Russell, Leclerc, Sainz etc. Russell for example has crashed out on himself out of a race, out of quali and out free practice this year, there's no way he could be rated higher than Norris. You are overly critical of Norris just because he was under the spotlight the most. That's kinda the trend while other drivers mistakes often go unnoticed or get forgotten in a week because they are not fighting for championships. Objectively speaking Norris is in contention for 2nd best driver on the grid with Leclerc this year. This is also where every expert is placing him, 2nd or 3rd best.
I really respect your work and always happen but after you posted that video before the season even ends I start. I started thinking differently about you and your opinions and now you are putting Nico in front of Fernando. That’s absolutely diabolical.
I would argue, that RB didn't even have the second best car since Miami. At least not all of the time. Ferrari and sometimes even Merc were at least equal around the mid/late summer period. It was always circumstancial who had the best, second best, third best car and so on from Miami onwoards.
Theres absolutely no way you can put lando in the top 5. From Miami to Qatar he hadnt gained a single point on Max despite having a faster car at nearly every weekend. He bottled so many chances and shoukd have made the championship way closer than it was.
@@tarikviaer-mcclymont5762 that doesnt excuse the fact that McLaren had the faster car in Spain Hungary Zandvort Italy Baku Singapore Brazil And Abu Dhabi. And he didnt catch up to max between Miami and Abu Dhabi despite red bull more often than not being the 3rd fastest car.
Norris wasn’t perfect this season, but he still won 4 races, finished P2 in the championship and played a huge role in helping McLaren win their first constructors title in 26 years. So yes, he deserves to be in the top 5.
You are kidding me with LeClerc in 2nd place 🤨 And Max only got his title as a gift from Red Bull in the first half of the season and then from McLaren and Piastri in the second part. Also Ferrari and Mercedes were on team Max because they stole points from McLaren 😒 And Max was on team Ferrari in Abu Dhabi when he took out Oscar, what a douchebag 😡 I went from loving Max in 2021-2023 to hating him in 2024.
Russell is, IMHO, by far and away the most "Mercedes" of drivers that swapping him for Max would probably be a massive mistake. I am *NOT* anti-Max in any way! I admire his ability no end. In fact I didn't find last year boring at all, as a neutral I was enjoying his record-breaking feats as I'm old enough to remember the last time some older ones had been broken. I just think that he's best suited to a team like Red Bull. It's a personality thing. Max isn't "corporate" by nature, George is. At least he's apparently more that way (who knows what's going on inside his head? 🤷🏻♀️). Also, if they really want Kimi Antonelli to succeed, putting him up against Max would not be the best idea! George needs to be fully backed by the team to allow him to flourish (assuming the car is halfway decent). I've been watching him since he was a young teenager on the British Touring Car Championship card in the junior categories (and Lando too), and he was definitely showing a shedload of promise. I genuinely think that with the wind blowing his way, he could be a champ. Ditto with Lando, and a very small bunch of others currently in F1.
How can you possibly equate the two? Lewis had a good car and was throttled by his copilot. Nico was fast, consistent, and clean. He performed beyond the expectations of his team, and Lewis simply didn’t.
I don't agree with Russel and Norris inclusion in the Top 5. Russel didn't quite proved himself, with Hamilton being the fastest Merc driver during the races. And Norris committed too many mistakes, threw away some possible wins and ended up loosing the title with perhaps what was the best car throughout the season. In their places I would put Gasly, being incredibly consistent, avoiding any damage during 24 races (which is an outstanding job) and Alonso, who somehow won the "best of the rest" title by far and dragged that painful to drive Aston Martin to 5th in the constructors all by himself.
I wouldnt put George in Top 5 to be honest. Why!? His crashes. Damn did he crash out in the last third of the season.... that was too much. I think my order would be: 1) Verstappen 2) Leclerc 3) Sainz 4) Hulkenberg 5) Norris i would like to explain why. Nico Hulkenberg over Norris because he had nowhere near the car to get that many points. it was his qualifying that allowed him to secure them. Norris i would have puit higher if he gets the chance to win the chip in abu dhabi. Norris did bottle too much races for me i have to be honest. Sainz came close to Leclerc many times also outqualified him also on some occasions and in melbourne + mexico he was unstoppable...
Honestly Lewis deserved to be in 5th, sure he wasn’t that great in qualifying but his race pace was definitely up there with Verstappen, Leclerc and so on at times.
I’m sorry the George rating is overrated. Lewis was being fazed out from the start had different car from George, was being used as a genuine pig. I mean there are literally picture where you can see how different the cars where every weekend. When has George even started significantly behind Lewis and beat him? Never. Look at Las Vegas Lewis started p10 almost beat him. Abu Dhabi Lewis started p16 and still beat him. Don’t get me wrong Lewis doesn’t need to be in your top 5 but neither does George, Lewis being fazed out of the team is what made George look good. He only finished 22 points ahead Lewis
I think Piastri and Gasly with the “all laps completed” (with 24 races mind you), and Gasly $0 damage across the full season are both honorable mentions.
Gasly was superb this year
$0 damage completing all laps is damn impressive, ngl
Gasly definitely took damage, that stat is not really true. His floor was damaged in the Japanese Grand Prix for example after a tangle with Ocon.
@@TheGamesWinI think the 0 damage means 0 damage was caused by himself.
I lowkey think “honorable mentions” are even bit low for Gasly
I still feel Sainz is a bit underrated. He had a great season. I don't think many drivers would run Leclerc as close as he has. I think Leclerc is clearly the 2nd best driver on the grid. Losing 14-9 to Leclerc in qualifying, who is arguably the best qualifier on the grid is a very good effort. Losing 14-8 in the races is also nothing to sniff at. A lot of drivers would look average against Leclerc, but Sainz has held his own and has been consistently strong in 2024.
Still a good top five though, Aldas.
100% agree charles is up there and improved so much so excited for next year
Sainz is definitely not underrated
He is the reason ferrari lost the constructors to begin with. They had a chance and with rookie mistakes in canada baku brazil (crashing out himself like a novice) ferrari lost. He then played victin in miami crying for 5 laps for piastri to get a penalty for a fair defense and then took him out of the race and got a light 5 second penalty. He then got lucky with max retiring in australia, adding to his career of fluke wins. Underperformed massively in belgium and italy. Got beaten by slower mercs in singapore and this was because of his rookie error in qualifying. 50+ points and ferrari easily win the constructors. When there is a championship involved, like this season and 2022, Sainz only appears for one race and disappears for the next 10
When he beats leclerc, leclerc then beats him for the next 5 races and deestroys him. Sainz can only beat leclerc by a few seconds.
No, he is not underrated. The car on this year suited on his driving style for the most of year as it was understeery which is completely against Charles's style and Charles beat him by such a big difference.
Totally agree, everyone acknowledges that Charles is the second best driver on the grid and arguably the best qualifier and yet Sainz doesn’t get recognised as one of the best driver on the grid, even tho he very often keeps pace with Charles
Perez will 100% be on the worst driver list
Stroll won’t be tho, my goat 😤😤
I want to give a special moment to Pierre Gasly. I think his performances, despite having a tractor for the majority of the races, have been brilliant, especially towards the end of the season! I think if Alpine continue to improve their car over the winter, Gasly is going to be right up there at the top of the mid field.
Hülkenberg over Alonso is crazy. Fernando hasn’t had the fifth-fastest car since Miami, yet he still has double the points of Nico.
hulk literally had a hass and got so many top 10 quali places and outqualified max in abu dhabi with a mega lap, alonso made mistakes this season
Facts Fernando has been one of the best drivers this year considering the machinery he has had amazing drives particularly Saudi japan China Qatar and many more
@best___0999 You speak as if the Haas had been worse than the Aston Martin this year, when the Astons have been the worst car alongside the Saubers in some of the last races of the season
@best___0999Literally everyone made mistakes this season. I'd say all the top drivers apart from George and Charles made more errors and were less consistent.
Alonso had a mid season slump vs stroll whilst hulkenberg didn't have a slump like he did
sainz deserves top 5 imo, he had a few low points and crashes and he wasn't as consistent as leclerc, but him only being a few points off piastri says a lot
Him being only a few points away from Piastri tells more about Oscar's lack of performance than Sainz's brilliance, even though Carlos has had a very good season
Sainz’s crashes cost Ferrari the championship…
@@danielcombrinck9528 perez crashing into him cost them the championship
I think perez deserves a spot on this list. He was easily the best mclaren driver this year, allowing them to easily secure their first constructors championship in over 25 years
Thanks for giving Max’s P2 in Silverstone a shoutout 🤣 I’ve been championing that drive for months. I went and rewatched it last night and I totally forgot that he was probably 1 lap away from winning it too 🤣
george had a really good season if u u ask me, he gets a lot of hate, but he demolished lewis in quali and finished ahead of him despite the dnf in silverstone and dsq in belgium, aside from the mistakes in canada and australia he did good imo, altho merc basically forgot about lewis this season
I would switch Lando and George. Lando made lot of mistakes in races including defending race lead in first lap, and wheel to wheel battles. Whereas George beat 7 time world champ in the same car. He finished 4th (14 seconds behind race lead) in a race where LH44 pleaded to retire the car. Also Carlos is underrated, he lost many points in DNF's.
Max Verstappen is the the Formula World Champion and McLaren is the Formula Constructors World Champion. Fernando Alonso is the Formula 1.5 Champion and Aston Martin is the Formula 1.5 Constructors Champion.
Top 5 is really hard. Gotta leave out so many good drivers no matter who you pick.
I have to agree with your 1-4, but could be swayed on 5. Alonso and Gasly did very well with the cars they had too.
I think Russel was ahead of Norris, and closer to Leclerc than he was to Norris. If you look at the results each driver got in relation to the car they had underneath them, Russel is easily top 3, very often got the best possible result he realistically could with the car he drove on each weekend.
I disagree. Russell has some great races but also underperforms in other races. I think he lacks consistency. The fact that Hamilton caught him in Abu Dhabi should never have happened. Kinda like Verstappen catching Perez in Miami 2023. That shows a difference in quality between the drivers. I am not sure where exactly that Mercedes was this year. Clearly 4th best car, but the gap between them and the top team was difficult to estimate.
@@janvisser4132 in Abu Dhabi he got handed a terrible strat, he obviously should have pitted
Russell stepped up this season bit time,i agree norris can deliver a perfect weekend but with the dominant car...when its close norris always loses
Tbh I just don't see Russel beating Charles with the race pace he has. They are nearly equal in quali but Charles is more consistent and he is definitely clear in race craft and race pace. I just don't see george beating Charles, I don't think his race pace is even Sainz level
Piastri and Sainz being criminally underrated once again !!!
I totally agree about Sainz I certainly think he’s on Russell’s level, but I don’t think Piastri can be higher than 8th or 9th this season when he got slapped up by Lando. He is an incredible talent but not on Lando’s pace consistently enough, I’d have Gasly and arguably Alonso above him as well for this season
They both have had a good season. No more, no less. There are however atleast 5 drivers with a great season who have performed better through the whole season relative to the car they had.
Piastri is overrated at best. He got his ass kicked by Norris on regular basis.
@@peterfighteris his 2nd season, with 2 wins
My Top 5 of 2024: Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri and George Russell. Fernando Alonso is my top driver of the midfield.
Charles Leclerc is simply Ferrari's "not so secret" weapon against Max Verstappen. Hopefully 2025 will give us lots of wheel to wheel battles between these 2. It's entertaining when these 2 start fighting on track. Max is scared of nobody however, he respects Charles. Apart from a racing incident in the first lap in Austra, I can't think of any other on track battles that have gone wrong for him. So maybe the most clean driver in wheel to wheel battles this year as well?
If Aston Martin had 2 Strolls they would be 8th in the constructors, but they are 5th because Alonso has triple Stroll's points, almost the same percentage of Max vs Checo. With the tractor Alonso has driven he should be 5th on the list at least, or possibly behind Sainz, who is always so underrated. He is just less than half a tenth slower than Leclerc on average and not too far off in points with one less race
Sainz is still 54-56 points behind Leclerc if he drove in Saudi. The points gap is significantly wider than the quali gap
Don’t diss the goat, stroll is just letting Fernando beat him 😤😤
such a deluded alonso fangirl as usual. Why do you think drugovich isnt even in the car yet? One practice session goes and he already beat your finished idol in abu dhabi. Alonso has weak teammates so all of his deluded fangirls can make statements like this. They were faster than mercedes at the beginning of the year (moreso in china saudi and australia) i mean if stroll qualifies ahead of russell, that told you how fast the aston was to begin with. Alonso wasn't even amazing he put the most embarrassing performance in imola and even got beaten by stroll in half the races 😆
@@sadikurrahman4833turn on the tv when watching f1 please
for me the most impressed i was is with Verstappens race iq, many see mexico as headloss but had he let Lando by Lando would definitely win and Max p4 losing 13 points, instead byt running wide and holding Lando, Lando lost the win and gained 10 points on Max. then theres races like cota too
Lets be honest Max did not calculate that much in Mexico, It's just a coincidence that things went his way
Oookay but u forgot 80% points from aston are on Alonso's back.
Love your content Aldas
charles is deffo my driver of the year after max, he almost got P2 in the WDC and most wins after max and lando and he had a top 5 in every race aside silverstone and hungary, bad strategy and taken out lap 1
I kinda think that George already has a contract ready to go. Both him and Toto have chatted in interviews about there being a longer contract in the past and George was recently talking about the 2026 engine in a podcast. I don't think he's worrying about a contract extension. Even though Lewis left, George made it so that Mercedes didn't fight that hard to keep him. I think he's got job security.
I agree withyour top 4 because its my top 4 too, and i think giving that 5th spot to nico feels right. I think he was great through whole season, but i also think Pierre and Fernando deserve to be highlighted. Carlos also was i think great this year
I don’t think George is under that much pressure. Mainly because I don’t see max ever being at that team, he’s either gonna stay at Red Bull or retire, no in between. George also got some great wins and I don’t see kimi standing up to him until mid 2026 at the earliest. George will be okay.
You talk about Hulk being 5th as if he is some diversity pick, while you could make a strong argument of him being the 4th best this year.
Also i want to give a shoutout to Gastly and Alonso for 5th. In my opinion all these 3 drivers have been overpreforming compared to the car more than Russel
Agreed but lets face it, in all these lists everyone just has drivers in the best cars. The fact Hulk has found himself in this list makes it better than the vast majority.
Personally I'd put George above Lando but a strong list nonetheless .
Wait , how is Alonso not number 5? He was BY FAR the best driver in a complete tractor as compared to last season.
He wanted to give the fifth place to a midfield driver
someone forgot how fast the aston was at the beginning of the season. Typical plastic alonso fangirls always blaming the car
Aldas is a hidden gem.
Tough to narrow it down to 5 when there’s only ~20 drivers
I’d personally put Gasly 5th, I think he took that car to the limit. Would also swap George and Lando
Piastri was a top 5 driver this year, and will challenge for a title in 2025.
I will die on this hill.
Since when does getting ragdolled by your teammate warrant you a top 5 place in driver rankings?
@ ragdolled?
He won 2 races, a sprint, and got 8 podiums, raced every lap, had some incredible overtakes, and led Lando for the majority of Miami (Lando's first win) before getting unlucky, even though he didn't even have THE FULL UPGRADE.
But it's just an opinion, dude.
@@4share643 He had a good car so of course he's got some decent results, I'm not trying to say he's a bad driver. But when compared to his teammate he did get ragdolled. Losing quali h2h 4-20 is bad, probably only Perez did worse than that this season. 0 poles vs 8 poles is also bad. Overall race pace diff is also quite big, Oscar did have a good run during the mid-season, but after the summer break he just wasn't good enough.
Being outqualified 20-4 is bottom 5 level. Worse than Stroll and Riccardo who will likely be on the bottom 5 video
@@4share643Bro you are only mentioning Piastri's highlights. Let's talk about him BEING ABSOLUTELY MID in all races except Miami,Hungary,Spa,Monza and Baku and sprint races
I've been a George Stan since the PowerPoint, so thank you for recognizing how good this season was for him.
I’m a big Lando fan but I feel like that some other driver like Alonso or Gasly would be more deserving of the top5
Agreed, I have seen many put hin in the top but Lando did under deliver
Top4 is pretty clear but for me no 5 is close between Hulk, Alonso, Gasly and Sainz
#5 was indeed either Hulk, but Gasly wouldn't have been a strange pick either. You might like some others scrape off the WDC from the list, since that person is the biggest of all big winners anyway. Gives more room to consider the others in the field.
Well thought through Aldas. Lando/McLaren had their chance but couldn’t do it. It might be Oscar/McLaren for that team next year. Lando is quick enough but needs steel and utter determination to improve on this year.
You got that 2007 cut
Very good Video Aldas and not bad your Top, but I completely don’t agree with the fact to put Lando in the Top 5 and instead to not put Fernando in that Top, also don’t agree with the fact that Max had the 2nd overall best car this season, for me he had the 3rd overall best car and sometimes the 4th in some tracks like Monza, Baku, Mexico or Abudhabi.
Lando don’t deserve to be on the Top 5 because since Miami he had a car to fight for the championship and to win it in the end, the McLaren wasn’t dominant but it was definitely the most consistent and solid car of the Top 4 because they were strong in every track (except Las Vegas), him, Oscar and the team lost a ton of opportunities, to know how bad their season his Lando was 52 points behind Max after his 1st win in Miami, after Abudhabi the gap increased into 63 points despite having had a faster car than Max’s car in those 19 rounds between Miami and Abudhabi (except Spielberg and Las Vegas), and like you said on the video the fact that he was more closer to lose the 2nd than to fight for the 1st it’s another very bad point and example from his disappointing season and doesn’t help to valorise and judge his performance overall, if one of the 3 world champions and even Charles would had that McLaren they would have won easily the championship with 2 or 3 rounds to go.
For Fernando sadly the majority of the F1 community and fans are considering his season as normal where in reality it isn’t normal, the Aston had something similar to the Redbull, in the 1st part of the season it was the 5th best car and by far the best car of the midfield and more closer to the Top than to the midfield but since they came with upgrades in Imola they start to lose so much performance and they failed completely the development of the car, they didn’t find the solution and because of that they keep falling and falling until they end up being the penultimate best car just better than the Sauber, the other teams developed their cars and Aston stagnated, the typical Luck of Fernando Alonso 😂, and with that car he realised the miracles to put that green tractor more than 1 time in Q3 and to finish several on the Top 10 scoring points, maybe people see his season as normal because we are used to see him extracting of a car more than he’s capable, but it isn’t normal because to do that with 43 years old it’s immense, and when the car was competitive in the beginning of the season he made some incredible drives like in Jeddah, Melbourne, Suzuka or Shanghai when he was challenging the Mercedes, McLarens with a slower car.
For the rest I agree, my Top 5 is :
1 Max Verstappen, for the same reasons you explained in the video.
2 Charles Leclerc, for the same reasons you explained.
3 George Russel, for the same reasons you explained.
4 Fernando Alonso and I explained why.
5 Nico Hulkenberg also for the same thing you said on the video.
Honorable mentions : Pierre Gasly and Carlos Sainz.
The Lando hate has gotten too far. If you judge his season objectively and not in comparison to max who's literally one of the greatest drivers' oat, you'd see he had a really good season. There's a reason the Mclaren didn't look nearly as strong in piastris hands even tho he is a talented driver as well, and its Lando.
I would rate the drivers based on their performance in San Pablo.
"I was not alive in 1998"... when did I get old??? 😮😮
I was born in 2002, I've been watching F1 since 2004.
Daily reminder that you can't outperform a car
So best drivers top 5 - Best Oscar Piastri, 2nd best Danny Ric, 3rd best Jack Doohan ( I mean he didn't do anything wrong this year did he?), 4th best Valteri "Honorary Aussie" Bottas and finally 5th best Lewis Hamilton. Yeah I may be just a wee bit baised here! ;-)
I think piastri underperformed a lot after the summer break 🤔
Norris is fast, but doesn't deserve in the list here for this year. It should be max, charles, hulk, george, alonso/gasly in that order
Who gets an honourable mention for the top 5 best drivers
Music?
Maybe 5th for Lando if we are stretching it, but 3rd is way too high. I get that he comprehensivly beat Oscar, but ultimately both of the McLaren drivers squandered a fantastic piece of machinery they had at their disposal. Lando just squandered it a bit less humiliatingly.
You are talking as if those McLaren's were 2023 Redbull levels of dominant when in reality it was probably the best overall car during a season by a very slight margin
@@pro_grapist there were far too many missed opportunities, what you say is true though. the mclaren was nowhere near as good as the RB19 but one of the advantages that mclaren had was actually having 2 drivers... you would think that they should have won more races than they really did.
@@pro_grapist I called it a fantastic piece of machinery, not outright dominant. That's the biggest issue: McLaren won in those few occasions when their car was truly dominant, but when they only had a small advantage (but an advantage nevertheless), they often managed to throw away those wins. So I'll stand by my point: McLaren absolutely squandered the potential of their car.
@patepulkkinenvtec2403 You say that McLaren drivers have humiliatingly absolutely squandered cars potential and that Norris is 5th best driver this season IF WE'RE STRETCHING IT. These claims imply that McLaren was supposed to just sweep both championships like 2023 RedBull.
Yeah Lando and Oscar have done mistakes, but so have other drivers like Russell, Leclerc, Sainz etc. Russell for example has crashed out on himself out of a race, out of quali and out free practice this year, there's no way he could be rated higher than Norris. You are overly critical of Norris just because he was under the spotlight the most. That's kinda the trend while other drivers mistakes often go unnoticed or get forgotten in a week because they are not fighting for championships.
Objectively speaking Norris is in contention for 2nd best driver on the grid with Leclerc this year. This is also where every expert is placing him, 2nd or 3rd best.
My 5th place guy would be Alonso
I really respect your work and always happen but after you posted that video before the season even ends I start. I started thinking differently about you and your opinions and now you are putting Nico in front of Fernando. That’s absolutely diabolical.
Gasly? Alonso? Sainz?!
I would argue, that RB didn't even have the second best car since Miami. At least not all of the time. Ferrari and sometimes even Merc were at least equal around the mid/late summer period. It was always circumstancial who had the best, second best, third best car and so on from Miami onwoards.
Respect Professeur Gasly🫵🫵
Hulkenberg???
Erm, Gasly? Alonso?
Hülkenberg isnt undoubtedly the best midfield driver, gasly is definitely in the conversation
Gasly only came alive at the end of the season
@@As-qz5lr not really, he had some good points finishes mid season, it’s just that at the end he was exceptional
1 max verstappen 2 yuki who cares after that
max quite simply embarassed the whole grid cant lie he shouldnt have won this wdc with his car
Mate love your vids, but red bull is 3th… so its the 3th best car 😂
Theres absolutely no way you can put lando in the top 5. From Miami to Qatar he hadnt gained a single point on Max despite having a faster car at nearly every weekend. He bottled so many chances and shoukd have made the championship way closer than it was.
Yes Aldas is one of many F1 TH-camrs who just don't get enough brain cells together to realize Norris is definitely not up there.
@eliashardy9528 u guys act like Ferrari and Mercedes didn't step up during the season
@@tarikviaer-mcclymont5762 that doesnt excuse the fact that McLaren had the faster car in
Spain
Hungary
Zandvort
Italy
Baku
Singapore
Brazil
And Abu Dhabi.
And he didnt catch up to max between Miami and Abu Dhabi despite red bull more often than not being the 3rd fastest car.
Norris wasn’t perfect this season, but he still won 4 races, finished P2 in the championship and played a huge role in helping McLaren win their first constructors title in 26 years. So yes, he deserves to be in the top 5.
@@liukin95good scores doesn't make you good. It's about how good u have to race to get that score.
You are kidding me with LeClerc in 2nd place 🤨 And Max only got his title as a gift from Red Bull in the first half of the season and then from McLaren and Piastri in the second part. Also Ferrari and Mercedes were on team Max because they stole points from McLaren 😒 And Max was on team Ferrari in Abu Dhabi when he took out Oscar, what a douchebag 😡 I went from loving Max in 2021-2023 to hating him in 2024.
Alonso was a top 3 driver btw
This guy does not know wheel
This is an opinion video. Feel free to make your own.
He is an alonso fan. It's all very close. Also alonso wasn't top 3 but you can make an argument for top 5 definitely
Very fair list. Nico was amazing.
Russell is, IMHO, by far and away the most "Mercedes" of drivers that swapping him for Max would probably be a massive mistake. I am *NOT* anti-Max in any way! I admire his ability no end. In fact I didn't find last year boring at all, as a neutral I was enjoying his record-breaking feats as I'm old enough to remember the last time some older ones had been broken. I just think that he's best suited to a team like Red Bull. It's a personality thing. Max isn't "corporate" by nature, George is. At least he's apparently more that way (who knows what's going on inside his head? 🤷🏻♀️).
Also, if they really want Kimi Antonelli to succeed, putting him up against Max would not be the best idea! George needs to be fully backed by the team to allow him to flourish (assuming the car is halfway decent). I've been watching him since he was a young teenager on the British Touring Car Championship card in the junior categories (and Lando too), and he was definitely showing a shedload of promise. I genuinely think that with the wind blowing his way, he could be a champ. Ditto with Lando, and a very small bunch of others currently in F1.
Hulk to RB please
Bro at least fix up and comb your hair if u gonna show us your face 😂
Overrated hulk massively. Top 8 this season at best imo
Sorry Albas even seen the first second I have to plus to the video!
I'm no Hamilton fan, but he outperformed Hulk in racecraft this year.
Aldas is a Verstappen fanatic. Will never give Hamilton the respect he deserves
How can you possibly equate the two? Lewis had a good car and was throttled by his copilot. Nico was fast, consistent, and clean. He performed beyond the expectations of his team, and Lewis simply didn’t.
@@Big-Preparation aldas is actually a lewis fan lol but isnt blind to admit max was the best driver this year brazil alone proved it
@@Big-Preparation hes an alonso fangirl
watch his older videos
@@Big-PreparationLol, Aldas has literally made a video where he explains why Hamilton is the GOAT...
I’ve never heard of that Shar Leclair guy you put in P2
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
I don't agree with Russel and Norris inclusion in the Top 5. Russel didn't quite proved himself, with Hamilton being the fastest Merc driver during the races. And Norris committed too many mistakes, threw away some possible wins and ended up loosing the title with perhaps what was the best car throughout the season.
In their places I would put Gasly, being incredibly consistent, avoiding any damage during 24 races (which is an outstanding job) and Alonso, who somehow won the "best of the rest" title by far and dragged that painful to drive Aston Martin to 5th in the constructors all by himself.
I wouldnt put George in Top 5 to be honest. Why!? His crashes. Damn did he crash out in the last third of the season.... that was too much.
I think my order would be:
1) Verstappen
2) Leclerc
3) Sainz
4) Hulkenberg
5) Norris
i would like to explain why. Nico Hulkenberg over Norris because he had nowhere near the car to get that many points. it was his qualifying that allowed him to secure them.
Norris i would have puit higher if he gets the chance to win the chip in abu dhabi. Norris did bottle too much races for me i have to be honest.
Sainz came close to Leclerc many times also outqualified him also on some occasions and in melbourne + mexico he was unstoppable...
Charles LeCrash......brutal
Russell will be a worse title challenger than norris tbh
yeaaaah....you are a REAL formula 1 expert. NOT!!!
First
Love your content Gordon
Wheres your medal?
How very dare you, no Lewis! But I totally agree with you.
Who is Lewis?
Honestly Lewis deserved to be in 5th, sure he wasn’t that great in qualifying but his race pace was definitely up there with Verstappen, Leclerc and so on at times.
At times....well written. Very little times
Consistency matters man, It matters
I’m sorry the George rating is overrated. Lewis was being fazed out from the start had different car from George, was being used as a genuine pig. I mean there are literally picture where you can see how different the cars where every weekend. When has George even started significantly behind Lewis and beat him? Never. Look at Las Vegas Lewis started p10 almost beat him. Abu Dhabi Lewis started p16 and still beat him. Don’t get me wrong Lewis doesn’t need to be in your top 5 but neither does George, Lewis being fazed out of the team is what made George look good. He only finished 22 points ahead Lewis
1. Sainz 2. Yuki 3. Max. 4. Hulk 5. Sharl
Holy shit that’s my list too! 🎉
@@thejonathanrath ??😭