Alexander Albon (P5, 10 pts): 8/10
We were very impressed by Alex Albon this week. On race performance alone it's possible that he would have ended up our top-rated driver in Sochi after a spectacular, battling performance that saw him start from pit lane and fight his way all the way up to fifth place finishing just behind his Red Bull team mate. It's just the sort of thing that Christian Horner and Helmut Marko had been hoping to find in the team's number two driver. However against that it has to be pointed out that the original reason for his pit lane start was the fact that he'd crashed in qualifying and damaged the RB15, so it was a bit of a self-inflicted (and tailwind-assisted) wound in the first place. Even before that, Albon had been looking uncomfortable on the Sochi circuit, finishing a full second behind Max Verstappen in FP1 and then inexplicably doubling the deficit in FP2. The fact that he overcame such setbacks in the race itself is very much in his favour, but does still mean a few marks off his overall rating.
