Button
Vettel
Hamilton
Barrichello
Webber
Raikkonen
Rosberg
Alonso
Glock
Fisichella/Heidfeld

Alonso?

I would only expect it to be limited to 'this year' and what we saw. Forget that Kimi, Fred and Lewis are World Champs, how well did they conduct themselves this year in this car. Ideally it would also ignore results but realistically this will never happen because their position in the races dictates how much camera coverage they get.

Nevertheless, I think it's rare for there to be a list, like this, which seems to attract so much disagreement. I can usually see, broadly, that they make some sense. This one seems just weird.

Completely agree. On what grounds are Kubica, Alonso and Massa ahead of Raikkonen?

Wtf?

You gotta be blind as a bat to say Alonso looked uninspired in 2009. He was visibly driving the wheels off his car, even in practice sessions when horner marvelled at his car control and committment and said it was the lap of the day at singapore. To get 26 points, a podium and 2 fastest laps in the one of the worst cars on the grid while dominating his team mates, took anything but uninspired driving. He spun off twice early in the season from pushing too hard, and he even got a couple of poles so im really really wondering what you based your conclusion on.

Mine:

1. Hamilton
2. Button
3. Vettel
4. Barrichello
5. Webber
6. Raikkonen
7. Rosberg
8. Massa
9. Heidfeld
10. Kubica

For me this year...

1. Jenson Button
= Lewis Hamilton
= Kimi Raikkonen
= Sebastian Vettel
5. Mark Webber
6. Nico Rosberg
7. Rubens Barrichello
8. Robert Kubica
9. Fernando Alonso
10. Sebastian Buemi

All the top 4 drivers drove some oustanding races but had also few weak races, so nobody clearly stands above the rest. Massa can not be taken into account due to his absence (but would probably be among top 10). Webber had very consistent year, shown some outstanding race craft although he was mostly beaten by Seb in Qualis. Nico matured a lot this year and is slowly becoming a real threat to the alfa dogs. Could score a bit more I think. Rubens had quite a revival in the second part of the season but made few f**kups on his own on some races, so no higher than 7th (bare in mind: he had a WCC car!). Robert was much like Alonso victim of a dodgy car. They both shown some outstanding performances, wasn't for Vettel Kubica might have even won the opening of the season! Alonso was mostly in the blindsight for most of the season (quite an achievement when looking at that appauling R29 color scheme ), the car was really a huge pile of c*** and scoring a podium with it was the most anybody could do (by anybody i mean the likes of Lewis or Kimi). Buemi was the rookie and the surprise of the season! Shown great maturity for a probe like that! Kudos!

Special kudos: Kamui Kobayashi! Two great races out of scratch! Hope he'll get a seat next year, Sato has a true hair to the crown!

Anyone who becomes WDC is worth #1 in my book. I cannot see why Lewis is at the top of this list. It is not as though he had to drive the wheels off the car. When the car was poor he was unable to do anything. He did the job when he was given the equipment but that does not entitle him to be considered #1 imo. It is an insult to both Button and Vettel. I might have been able to accept a case for Seb or Rubens being #1, but not Lewis. Certainly not this year. I would always score Nick over Robert too.

So you think those 10 drivers could have gotten more out of the renault than Alonso did in 2009? Thats what your basically saying with that list.

Heidfeld beats Kubica and is not even on the list while Kubica is 5th.

If it would be a ranking based on the points at the end of this season, it would look something like that:

1 Jenson Button
2 Sebastian Vettel
3 Rubens Barrichello
4 Mark Webber
5 Lewis Hamilton
6 Kimi Räikkönen
7 Nico Rosberg
8 Jarno Trulli
9 Fernando Alonso
10 Timo Glock

Wow, a bunch of fanboys going apesh*t over someone else's opinion. Funny as hell.

Every goddamn ranking list other than the one presented by the points scored throughout the season will be subjective, deal with it. And even points don't reflect who's the better driver, only who has the better car.




This is what some call context.

That I did not know

How many Polish journalists work at Autosport?

I'm a fan of both RK and NH and I follow them closely.
This year, Nick had 5 good races and Robert had 2.
The car was awful. At least till the Valencia update.
Heidfeld had much worse luck overall.
Look at Brazil. His Q1 was under water and then they forget to put fuel in his car.
So, we will never know how he would have done here, at what I consider Robert's finest race.

Results from Makarias' voting championship.

1) Jenson Button
2) Sebastian Vettel
3) Mark Webber
4) Lewis Hamilton
5) Kimi Räikkönen
6) Rubens Barrichello
7) Nico Rosberg
8) Timo Glock
= Jarno Trulli
10) Robert Kubica

That is a fair top 10 IMO.

Quite a lot, when there's a leak.

I've never witnessed Alonso driving in a nonchalant way, Alonso is one of the greats on the grid and the fact that he'll be driving for Ferrari next year personally has me nervous!

...in this world you live, is the sky pink by any chance?

Renault didn't make the progress in development that they made last year, when Alonso was clearly hungry to show he still had it.

My guess is Alonso knew he had the Ferrari seat coming and subconsciously scaled back his effort.

True it isn't all about points but it's hard to see why they would put someone in the top 10 who was beaten by their teammate who isn't in the top 10:S

Sometimes and I am told that it makes shepherds very happy.

Sorry, of course Lewis should be #1

As I said above...

The development of the Renault chassis, for one. They didn't make the progress they made last year, when Alonso was really hungry to show he still had it. I don't think Alonso put in the work to help the team develop the car like he did in 2008, which was just brilliant work from him.

His teammates aren't really the greatest yardsticks.

He had his moments, to be sure. But then there were days- Turkey, Silverstone- when he just didn't seem to want to be around.

The Renault wasn't "one of the worst cars on the grid" until late in the year. It was a solid upper-midpack runner most of the year, especially after they fitted the DDD on it.

Don't get me wrong; I respect Alonso very much as a driver. I just don't think his 2009 was as good as a few others'.

Not really.

The winner is usually the one with the best car over the season. By best I mean best combo of speed and reliability.

What are the odds that the best driver can always have the best car in a season? There is alot of teams, alot of drivers. What's Bernie supposed to do, switch the teams and drivers around midseason?

And to try and "factor in" the speed of the car or driver, everyone is just guessing. I don't think there are many people on this board who can accurately do it. Myself included. Everyone is too biased and it takes alot more time then most people have to get even close to an accurate idea of it, and even then it probably ends up just being a guess. Some of us try and be fair, but in the end we are still just guessing.

There is 5 different lists that autosport could have made and for me it'd be hard to argue any of them. I'm happy Webber got some credit because for years he's been top 5 with a bad car on autosport lists, and this season kind of justified it, and he's still top 5 even with a good car so that's nice. Lewis deserves some credit (but IMO he threw away too many results to be #1, like Monaco, Monza). Vettel had a few bad moments as well. So did Rubens and Webber. Button was Mr Consistant but his hyped "smooth" style also leads to problems in certain situations and he definately suffered more then Rubens in those situations. That was his only blemish. It's so hard to judge Kubica and Alonso but we know from previous years how good they are. I think Rosbergs first 5 or so races were pretty bad, but later on he was good. Massa was on top of Kimi until his injury. And Kimi was best in the races that suited his car (like all the other drivers). He did a good job in that 3 month span but overall in the last 2 years has been very dissappointing, and it's not surprising that the top teams no longer want to pay high amounts for him. Trulli, Glock, Sutil, Fisi and others had their moments when the car was strong but overall weren't that impressive over the season but did have their moments. Grosjean showed what I always thought about Piquet, it wasn't as much the driver as the team. And alot of weak links have been cut going into next season, and for Heiki/Nakajima for example, it's hard to argue with it. Making an accurate list out of those thoughts is very hard.

About Alonso's car, in reference to maccaFTW, I do think the car was that bad. People say that Lewis had one of the worst cars but it won races. The sheer amount of times that he qualified in 8th or so with low fuel in Q3, showed how bad it was. In some of these situations they got lucky and some good points but overall it was quite embaressing for Renault. McLaren's car was flawed in the fast aero corners but at least it was solid/great in the slow stuff. Even in S1 at Bahrain early on Lewis was the quickest in there all weekend, or one of the quickest in S3 at Spain. Renault was slow on all corners.

The first one that makes sense.

HeHe

In all seriousness though you don't have to and obviously don't agree with his ranking as No.1 Driver this season despite him proving to be just that since his entry in 2007 and that's cool, however to state that he didn't "drive the wheels off his car" which you did was what I was making jest of, that's ALL Lewis does!

Please point me to a race where he didn't drive the wheels off his Mclaren; i'd like to be directed to a stint where he used cruise control??

Correct, but ONLY in his hands; in the races where he won have a look at where his teamate placed the very same car for proof that it was he who drove that car places where it didn't belong...

Good list.

Kubica was robbed of so many points this year it was silly... whilst I don't believe Robert was the 5th best driver this year, I think it can be justified to place him ahead of Nick.



WAH?!?!? Are you seriously joking me?

Let's take a look here...

Robert:
Australia - taken out whilst in 3rd
Malaysia - engine failure
Spain - clutch issue off start, lost out big time
Monaco - brake failure (to be fair though, not in the points)
Belgium - underpowered engine, forced to run light in qualifying - lost out in race massively
Italy - ridiculous, inconsistent penalty and then an engine problem forcing him to retire
Singapore - lost out because he was farther away from pitlane than others when the safety car came out, dropped places as a result
Japan - played fairly by the rules in qualifying and paid the price because practically everyone else cheated, was further down the grid than should have been as a result
Abu Dhabi - engine failure in a vital session meant that the team had no idea how the car was going to behave during the second stint. Robert dropped off massively as a result of wrong tyre pressures

That's over half the races on the calendar affected by sheer bad luck - 8 of those that mostly likely would have resulted in points if things had gone in Robert's way.

Nick:
Singapore - taken out by Sutil (whilst not in the points)
Brazil - sent out at just the wrong time in q1, unfuelled car in race

Please, feel free to add to Nick's list. I'm sure that since you're willing to make such a bold statement that you're capable of backing it up with some evidence. From what I've seen, though, Nick certainly hasn't been anywhere near as unlucky this season.

By far the most sensible post in this thread. Everybody is biased, but this one tries to reason.

H2H

Top ten list of "F1 Magazine lists that people have agreed with":

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

1. not really one driver
2. Jenson Button
= Lewis Hamilton
= Kimi Raikkonen
= Sebastian Vettel
6. Mark Webber
= Nico Rosberg
= Rubens Barrichello
9. Robert Kubica
= Fernando Alonso


Not really one driver who deserved the #1 spot imo this year.

Button came closest but had a bad mid-season slump, Kimi some brilliant drives but sometimes not really on, Vettel great year but still too many mistakes and Hammy some great races but also mistakes (like Monza) also someone who tried to screw a fellow competitor out of some points and starts the season by blatantly and repeatedly lying, doesn't deserve any honours in my book.

Then Webber and Barrichello with some solid races and a much improved Rosberg with a sometimes awful, sometimes great Williams.

Honorable mention for Kubica and Alonso who drove horrible cars this year but sometimes made the cars look better than they actually were.

What Heidfield did that ppl assume that he shuld be higher than Kubica? Driving whole season without slightest strong performance? Earning smal points by luck? That he hasn't any engine failure? For that he was outperformed by Kubica in qualy? That he didn't show any fight on track?

So if gathered point are the most important in opinioning driver, if HEI is better than KUB, so what is the point of making such "top 10 lists" what's the oint of this topic and similar topics? Taking your logic we should take first 10 of champoinshi table and say that they are the top ten!

Could you ppl explain to me why are you assume than HEI is better than KUB because he scored more points than Kubi and simultaneously you think that HAM was better in 2009 than BUT? After all BUT scored more points, didn't he? (BUT and HAM are only examples, but this refers to all drivers)

So what? Points system is functioning at BMW but with oters not?

I believe this merits a QFT tag.

Fisichella had easily the better car there. When on same cars Kimi destroyed poor Fissi.

These lists are absolute nonsense, they are polemical tools designed to generate "buzz" and revenue.

In my view there were no outstanding drivers this year.
* Button won while he had a far superior car (double diffuser). Midseason, when the other teams cought up he struggled till the last race.
* Hamilton drove like a rookie early in the season when the car wasn't performing then reverted to his WDC form when the car improved (diffuser and KERS)
* Vettel committed some dumb mistakes and had more than his share of engine troubles. Old engines also hampered him in the last few races yet he managed to stay in contention
* Rubens proved himself nearly as good as Jenson. had they stayed on the same team I wouldn't bet against him
* Webber showed that he had similar pace to Vettel. I won't bet against him either although Vettel has an advantage in age
* Alonso, Kubica and Hidefeld got stuck in a bad cars
* Kimi and Massa masked the shortcomings of their Ferrari and in my view got the most out of their car
* Nico did ok if we compare him to his teammate it will be interesting to see if he can step it up a notch next year

There is really no way one can pick a clear #1 driver on the basis of merit this year

Why they put Rubens so low down I can't understand? Other than that the top three are about right

Hamilton first... I didn´t expect that.

It´s logic coming from an english magazine but at the same time it´s sad. Definitely, english journalists are as idiots as the spanish ones.

Massa ahead of Kimi.


HAHAHAHAHHAHAHHHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHHAHAHA

1st Jenson Button
= or 2nd Lewis Hamilton
3rd Sebastian Vettel
4th Rubens Barrichello
5th Mark Webber
6th Kimi Raikkonen
7th Nico Rosberg
8th Felipe Massa
9th Jarno Trulli
10th Robert Kubica

Kubica drove well but to the armchair experts on here, who base everything on a drivers finishing positioning in his last race, they will disagree, but it doesn't mean they were right.

You can drive well and not get results thru factors outside your control, that much should be clear to the more enlightened amongst us.

True. Not denying his fine drives, Aus and Brazil really spring to mind but the fact is for most of the season he didn't seem to have a handle on the situation or even his teammate.

I am not a Lewis detractor. I give him credit where credit is due and shouted up for him when people said (still say) that he did not deserve his WDC. I am sure that Lewis would have had a mush better season if the car had been right from race one. As it was he had a pretty good season. To say that his form in the last half of the season was good enough to make up for the bad races earlier on is not warranted. Even though Lewis and Jenson had opposite seasons in terms of good and bad halves, I would always give the WDC #1 status.

In one or two of his races especially after upgrades failed he was just ticking laps off. At one race he asked to retire and was told to stay out by his engineer.

Heidfeld score two points more in the whole 2009 season, but after penultimate race it was Kubica who had two points more than Heidfeld.

Kubica made into Q3 nine times, Heidfeld was in Q3 only five times.
With this crap car it was better starting from P11 or P13, cruising around and making some points by luck, like Heidfeld did, than fighting hard and making into Q3 on P8 or P10.

Otherwise known as the "autosport british drivers ranking suffixed with the autosport list of other drivers in order that we kind of like them except where we are forced to include some drivers against our better judgement" list

ps if it want for teh fact that webber was beaten in qualie and racing in teh same car by vettel, he'd have been third (ed). Cant we think of some way of making him third - he was the taller of the two!!! Next year!

I have seen many lists in my day, but this must be the silliest ever. I could somewhat agree with the top 4 altough I would put them in a different order, but Kubica 5th? He was nowhere this season. If you had any hope for a good BMW result you had to rely on Nick to make it. Rubens 9th? Jesus, he was stronger than Jenson the second half of the season. Massa ahead of Kimi? Ok, he looked slightly stronger than Kimi until the accident but it was very slightly and Kimi made a magnificent second half of the season, making podiums and wins with a car that was a disaster.

Everybody can not be on the top of the list, but that list is a joke.

Nick was only five times in Q3, while Kubica was in Q3 nine times.

The best result (on merit) for BMW was Kubica's second place in Brasil and Kubica's fourth place in Belgium.
Heidfeld's second place in Malaysia was by pure luck.

1. Massa
2. Kimi
3. Rosberg
4. Rubens
5. Hamilton
6. Vettel
7. Webber
8. Button
9./10. BMWs pair