Drivers can still make a difference
I watched Monza qualifying with a friend of mine, who is a casual fan of Formula 1 and Motogp. While Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas were smashing their ‘opposition’ to pieces, despite no ‘party’ engine modes, my friend began debating with me the influence of the rider in Motogp versus the importance of the driver in F1.
My contention was that people consistently underestimate the impact the driver has in F1, because the cars are so complicated, but yet it’s still apparent that drivers with similar machinery often achieve wildly differing levels of performance. The events of Monza’s race showed how drivers can still make the difference.
Hamilton dropped way off the back after a stop-go penalty, but finished less than 11 seconds behind Bottas, who struggled to fifth after a terrible first lap despite driving what is clearly and unequivocally F1 2020’s best car.
The way things panned out Lance Stroll was in prime position to claim his first win in F1.
The Racing Point is in the top three or four of fastest cars in F1 this season, but Lance botched the restart horribly and blew his shot. Pierre Gasly was driving a slower car than Stroll’s, but Pierre took his own chance to win with flawless composure.
We saw the human element of performance in F1 manifest: that mysterious mix of driving skill, feel, mental resilience, technical understanding and emotional intelligence that allows one person to achieve substantially more than another with similar equipment or opportunity at their disposal.
Which brings us to someone who was absent from the fight at Monza but who has been consistently Lewis-esque in his ability to drag amazing results from the car underneath him. Max Verstappen has made the RB16 look like the second quickest car on the grid this season, and an occasional Mercedes-botherer, but if the Red Bull was unquestionably the second-best car, Alex Albon would be finishing inside the top four regularly. He finished fourth once in the first eight races, and not once did he qualify that car inside the top four…
This is not to disparage Albon’s efforts in what is clearly a very difficult car to make work; more to highlight the exceptional work Verstappen is doing. Max is driving like a champion in waiting, but the car is not up to the job. Andrew Benson’s feature on page 36 explores the reasons for this in more detail.
With the rules the way they are, F1’s competitive order is unlikely to shift dramatically until 2022 at the earliest, which means Verstappen is likely locked into a losing cycle and will almost certainly miss his chance to achieve Red Bulls’ stated target of making him F1’s new youngest champion.
By the start of next season his moment will have passed. No matter how good Verstappen is or how well he drives, he simply can’t work miracles.