Pierre Gasly (SP15, P10, 1 pt): 7/10
Pierre Gasly had an "easy" time in the first round of qualifying, but admitted that after that things had got "complicated". He made it through to the final round of the session but had to settle for ninth place on the grid. It was more frustrating in the showdown when he found himself on the wrong tyres at the wrong time in changing conditions and missed the cut at the end of Q2 as a result, compromising his plans for the sprint race. He suffered a loss of grip at the start and dropped positions on the opening lap, and then passed on the opportunity to change from inters to slicks when the moment presented itself. He paid the price for his mistake, plunging down the order in the remaining four laps. He made a solid start to the race and was running behind Fernando Alonso in eighth place after pitting under the Virtual Safety Car, but lost out with his second stop which dropped him behind George Russell and Lance Stroll. It felt like he should have got better reward for all that hard work than a single solitary championship point.
Lance Stroll (SP4, P9, 7 pts): 7.5/10
Lance Stroll will probably remember this weekend as being only the second time that he has qualified ahead of his Aston Martin team mate Fernando Alonso, although the circumstances (with all those track limit violations causing laps to be deleted left right and centre) was a somewhat mitigating factor. Still, credit where it's due, and he was in touching distance of Alonso again in the showdown the following day so you can't say it was a fluke. He then got ahead of the Spaniard in the sprint, and Alonso was considerate enough to his boss's son not to provoke a battle over fourth place despite making a few pantomime darts around the place to make it look convincing. Stroll did bring it home and thoroughly deserved his five points, but unfortunately that good fortune didn't carry over to Sunday when he got blocked and lost three places at the start of the Grand Prix. The team subsequently stumbled over a double-stacking pit stop with Stroll coming off the worse of the pair dropping him to 15th by the time the Virtual Safety Car ended. After that he kept plugging away and had caught up to the back of Esteban Ocon by the time he made his second stop; but there was also a third to come which left him in 11th behind Alex Albon. He managed to overpower the Williams (as he should, really) and crossed the line in tenth behind Pierre Gasly, who was subsequently among those to receive a post-race penalty for track limits violations. Stroll didn't say no to P9.
