Lewis Hamilton (P4, 12 pts): 8/10
Given what he was up against this weekend, fourth place was actually a very good performance from seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton - albeit just slightly overshadowed by his Mercedes team mate George Russell once again stealing the spotlight with a second podium of the season; and also by the bumpy Baku track leaving Hamilton feeling battered and bruised with extreme back pain that might even force him to sit out next week's Canadian GP. He'd ended Friday and started Saturday down in 12th place, with the 'porpoising' of the W13 reaching new heights to the point where it was physically painful just to watch the video footage let alone actually be in the car. His despairing "I don't know what you expect of me sometimes!" ahead of his final Q2 run was positively heart-rending, but he did what he had to and made it through to the final round of qualifying, which was no small achievement even if Russell was two places further ahead. He lost out in the early flurry of pit stops under the Virtual Safety Car but benefitted from Sebastian Vettel's spin at the restart, and picked off Esteban Ocon on lap 18. By the time Charles Leclerc retired he was up to sixth and on lap 26 he was able to pass Daniel Ricciardo who was still running on an old set of the hard compound. Hamilton used the second VSC to refresh his own tyres, which meant he was easily able to catch and pass Pierre Gasly in the closing laps. While 2022 is proving far from a vintage season for Mercedes, getting two cars in the top four in Baku is the sort of result that their Ferrari counterparts could only dream about on Sunday.
George Russell (P3, 15 pts): 8.5/10
The last time George Russell finished a race behind his Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton was in Bahrain. Since then he's maintained a frankly astonishing run of top five performances, and in Baku he picked up his second podium of the season. He's the only driver to win points in every race, and as a result Mercedes is the only team on the grid to have scored in all eight rounds. Quite how Russell is achieving this sort of standard of performance and consistency in a car that is quite frankly proving to be an evil, twisted vixen is beyond the comprehension of our simple bear-like brains. After a solid start in FP1 Russell moved ahead of Hamilton in FP2 where he was seventh fastest, and in qualifying he calmly progressed to the final top ten pole shoot-out round and proved himself 'best of the rest' in fifth behind the Ferrari and Red Bull cars. Realistically that was also the very best that Russell could have hoped for in the race - until Carlos Sainz' hydraulics failed on lap 9 and Charles Leclerc's engine blew up on lap 21. Russell might have been a long way behind the remaining race leaders by this point, but he was also comfortably out of range of Pierre Gasly behind. All Russell had to do from there was keep it cool and calm and make it to the finish to pick up third place. He was undeniably fortunate to benefit from the expiration date on both Ferraris, but sometimes in life you get the luck you deserve just by being there in the right place and at the right time.
